and for those of you who are lazy ... here is the "novice" section of my strategy website ..
Novice:
Overview: winbolo is a top down view; tank strategy game, but you can't think of winbolo as simply a game, because its so much more, as a tank on the playing field you must act like you are a commander commanding his troops, all the same things apply, you must be considerate of terrain, traps, numbers vs skill, etc. all of these things combine make winbolo a game that can be enjoyed over and over, every time you play the game it can be a completely different experience that is the reason that I'm still playing this game long after I would have quit any other game.
Objective of the game: the objective of winbolo is to control all of the bases, so that your enemy can't refuel, this may or may not include owning all of the bases. you can do this in various ways, one is by simply capturing all of your enemies bases, the other ways include making it impossible for your opponent to refuel off the bases by placing your own pillbox's within range of the base in a way that they can't plant to refuel.
dying: In short, don't die. dying is a very bad thing in bolo, when you die it takes about 2-3 seconds to do the "death" animation, it takes another 2-3 seconds to put you at a starting point, which could be on the other side of the map from were your bases and pills are located. Once you get back to your bases, it takes 10-20 seconds to refuel, depending on how much you got hit while getting back, and how many mines you want. in this time, a good bolo player could have taken 2-3 pills from you if not more. In my experience I've had plenty of games were one single death is what tips the game to one sides favor, this can make running in to grab those dead enemy pills very dangerous.
basic takes: below are the basic horizontal takes, they can be done from any side.
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below are the basic skewed takes.
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here are the basic diagonal takes.
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these takes are all the basic takes I think that belong here, later in the advanced tactics section there will be in-depth screenshots, etc of double takes, and other such tactics.
learning from your mistakes: In winbolo, the only way to improve is to recognize what you've done wrong, in most cases you don't know what you have done wrong and should ask the person who were playing against or even your ally what mistakes you made. Once you've identified the problems that you have, you can start working on fixing them. fixing problems can most of the time just come from practice, but knowing what your weakness' are is also very important, because if you know how your vulnerable, you can avoid playing the game that way. Or you can try to only play the game that way in an attempt to improve those particular skills.
dodging: one thing people don't mention much, is the ability to dodge, if you can easily dodge tank fire, and pillbox fire, you will most likely to do well. one of the ways to become a good player is to not die, to not die means you have to work on not getting hit. this is were dodging comes into play I recommend making a map that has 2-3 pills in the middle of deep water, with a starting point close by, loading this map in practice, and then practice driving up and swerving in between these pills if you can do this for long periods without dieing, you will improve your basic dodging ability. without the simple ability to drive from what side of the map to the other without getting very hurt, it makes getting placed at a start point far from your own side a very real hazard. with good dodging skills you can minimalize this danger
taking pills with blocks: one thing people forget, is that pills can be taken with blocks as well as other pills, with less risk setting up blocks can sometimes take longer than the standard one pill as a block take, but if you are quick, you can plant a block, attack, turn to dodge while planting another block to finish off the pill, it can be quite effective at taking pills from peoples pill lines without worrying about losing a pill if you screw up. it can also create terrain changes that can help make assaulting your line a lot harder if used properly.
base running: base running is important, depending on your enemy (some opponents whine a lot if you base run in certain ways) you need to grab at least half the easy to obtain bases, on a map like chew toy 3 there is only 6 easy bases on each half, after this point its up to you weither you get the the other harder to get bases, normally I get them after clearing some of the pills guarding them. good dodging skills are essential for base running properly, another important thing is you must not die on your base run, dieing on your base run can put you on the other side of the map completely, this can completely destroy your start, and against a strong opponent, this is fatal.
dog fighting: dog fighting in winbolo is marginal at best, my first piece of advice is to avoid it if you can if you have to chase after someone, it is likely that a lot of your bullets will miss, even if they look like they hit, due to the nature of winbolo's networking architecture. its best to try to aim in front of your enemy tank by the amount of time you think the game is lagging, under heavy lag dog fighting is impossible sometimes its best to plant a pill, and heat it instead of hopping your flailing shots will hit your enemy enough to kill him. also, when trying to kill an enemy tank, don't underestimate the value of mines, a few well placed mines can often kill an enemy tank a lot faster than shooting them can. not to mention its always satisfying to know you killed your enemy due to a mine :)
teamwork: Teamwork is a key aspect of winbolo, without teamwork, the game is a lot less fun and sometimes very frustrating. The main aspect of team work is called decoying. decoying is essentially when one tank gets in a position that it will cause the enemy pill to shoot at them instead of the person shooting the pill, weither this by hiding behind a pill, a group of blocks, a enemy tank, or just running around without any of these things trying to attract fire. sometimes you can hide behind a ally pill while your ally shoots a enemy pill and take out 2 enemy pills that you couldn't normally double take, this is referred to as a double decoy or "dd" I will add in screenshots later if I have time. using proper teamwork, a couple of players can easily defeat any team not using teamwork. another thing you must realize is that you have to know your role, in a team, you have to take the role offered to you before the team can properly move forward, if your the strong player, you can't expect your weaker ally to lead the way, you must take the lead, if your ally is spiking, you have to fall in and help them. you can't ignore what your ally is doing. its very important to pay close attention to what is going on, on your own team.
refueling off spiked bases: refueling off of spiked bases is a essential skill that is required in a lot of situations one of the basic ways of doing this is by planting a block in between the enemy pill and your base. another way is to move back and forth just enough to cause the enemy pill to miss you, this is sometimes tricky and not as effective as just planting a block, but if you don't have your lgm its useful. now sometimes you will have to refuel off a base that your enemy has places a pill directly beside, do not fear, you can still get ammo from this base, the easiest method is by planting a block behind you, so the pill can't force you off the base, and then sitting on it, the pill will hit you, you will refuel one armor and then a few bullets, it will hit you again, etc until the base has no armor, or until your tank is full it takes twice as long as usual to refuel fully this way, I recommend only refueling enough to take the spiking pill.
keysetup: The default key setup is not very good, a good key setup has to have a few elements, one of these is the ability to drive with one hand, and mouse with the other hand this will allow you to release your builder for a pill plant or repair while still maneuvering or dodging this is required for you to become a good player if you stay with default keys you will be unable to move while repairing, this will allow people to know when you will release your builder and kill it almost every time. another thing a good key setup requires is the ability to easily scroll, I personally scroll more than I drive scrolling allows you to see what's going on around you. its very satisfying to know someone doesn't scroll manually and then use this knowledge to sneak up on them and kill them while they are trying a pill take. my personal keys are e,d,s,f for movement t for tank view, g for pillview, shift for mining, space for shoot. these are all on one hand, so I can mine,shoot,drive, and change views all with one hand, all at the same time if I choose. the other hand is keypad 8,4,6,5 for manual scrolling (this is were my hand rests while I'm not mousing) keypad + and enter for changing gunsight range. I chose these because they are huge, and hard to miss if I need to flail my fingers about looking for them, and because I can actually hit these keys while my hand is on the mouse, which is also useful. I chose the keypad because its closer to the mouse than the arrows making less arm movement to switch between them.
