Overview on Playing Tribes Part 2 Now we'll get to grips with the guts of Tribes. I'll walk you through things you'll need to know.

You can contact me by emailing: SAS@barrysworld.com Or by posting on the Message Board

Playing Tribes

Key Features

Options Menu
Pressing 'Tab' whilst playing Tribes will give you the options menu where you'll be able to change teams, or vote to:
Change the mission, Enable team damage, or Enter tournament mode.

Clicking yourself or another player's name will bring up details about the player and give you options to mute the player (useful if they are annoying you or you want to just concentrate on the game and not be bothered with players chit chat).

Also these the option to vote the player as an admin, or vote to kick him off the server.

All voting requests will appear a the bottom of your screen

To answer a vote press Shift + X for yes and Shift + D for no, or alternatively ignore the message and you'll not vote at all.

Mission Types & Objectives
Each mission has a number of objectives. Press 'O' to see them, especially if you've just joined the game, to find out what your team's mission is.

In Tribes there are six types of missions:

Capture and Hold - Grab an objective by touching the switch and trying to keep it under your team's control. Points are awarded for holding onto objectives for a set amount of time. Any turrets e.t.c associated with an captured objective also come under the teams control :)

Capture the Flag - Good old CTF. Try to cap the flag, by taking the enemy flag and touching yours. Extra points are awarded for defending your flag, and protecting your flag carrier.

Deathmatch - Basic free-for-all. Not played much.

Defend and Destroy - The aim is usually to destroy the enemy objectives and to defend yours. First team to have all their objectives destroyed loses.

Find and Retrieve - A number of objects or flags are spread out around the mission map. The aim is usually to get every item/flag to your base. Of course the enemy are trying to do the same, so you'll have to retrieve items/flags from the enemy base, but they will want to do the same. Chaos :)

Multiple Team - Up to four teams can play at once!

The Players

Every player you see within one of your teams radar zones will be identified with a triangle above their head. Green for a team mate, red for the enemy. In general, anything in the game that's green is on your side.

Each player will show how damaged he/she has by a small energy bar that appears when your aiming crosshair is on them. Also players skins will show damage. If their health is in the red then their skin will be bloody and full of holes!

Both team's base defences and stations (almost other things) will also show physical damage, but you'll only see the health bar for your own teams items, and not the enemies.

You may notice that the enemy have a different look to them. This is because there are four 'Tribes' in Tribes. Click on a link to find out the history of a Tribe:
(Note: you'll be taken to relativent page on the Tribesplayers web site)

Blood Eagle
Diamond Sword
StarWolf
Children of the Phoenix

Each of these have their own style of amour. On public servers your going to bump into the Blood Eagle (Red coloured armour), and Diamond Sword Tribes (Dark grey coloured armour)

Chatting
Global chat allows you to chat to everyone in the game. Press 'T' and type a message. All global messages are coloured yellow.

Team talk is done via the 'R' key, and all messages are in green.

Voice Commands
Instead of typing text messages to players, in Tribes you can use voice commands! There is a huge list to chose from. Press 'V' and you'll be faced with a menu with vocal commands for defence, attack, team,

Click an option to see the sub menu! :) You'll soon see anything you could type message wise can actually be shouted, so that other players can hear! :)

There is a number of voice tones to choose from for both male and female skins. :)

The Jet Pack
In other games a jet pack is usually a special item that you can pick up from time to time, yet in Tribes everyone has one permanently! This means fights not only take place face to face on the ground, they can take place absolutely anywhere.

Mastering the jet pack is the key to doing well in Tribes. One common problem players face is jetting straight up. To do this jump first then use your jet pack. If you look up and use your jet pack, you just hover a few centimetres above the ground.

Fighting whilst using the jet pack is not easy, but with practice you'll be able to pull of flashy manoeuvres and rain death on the enemy from above :)
Always keep an eye on the energy meter. If your flying high in the air and it reaches zero your going to come down hard.

Armour
In Tribes you can chose between one of three classes of amour.

Light Armour
Speed: Fast
Protection: Light
Weight: Light
Max. Weapon Load: 3
Light armour does not restrict your movement speed, but only allows you to carry three weapons. You also won't be able to pick up and use some of the heavier equipment like portable turrets, but you can pilot vehicles, and use the laser rifle, which the other two armour classes can't. You also start the game in light armour.

Medium Armour
Speed: Medium
Protection: Moderate
Weight: Medium
Max. Weapon Load: 4
The medium armour class slows your movement down by about 20%. You won't be able to use your jet pack as long as with the light armour, but you will be able to use all equipment available in the inventory station and carry four weapons at a time.


Heavy Armour
Speed: Slow
Protection: High
Weight: Heavy
Max. Weapon Load: 5
The heavy armour is for players who love to walk around like a brick wall and it takes a huge beating to kill a player wearing it. The major disadvantage is speed, you'll be very slow, but the protection of the amour as well as the ability to carry 5 weapons and any piece of equipment in the inventory stations make up for this slightly. This armour comes into it's own when defending. It has "This is my objective/flag, and I ain't moving!" written all over it. Trying to move one of these heavies is not easy.

The Inventory & Ammo Stations - Weapons, Ammo, Equipment
You'll usually start with light armour, a blaster, chaingun and the disc launcher as default. Unlike other games where you can wonder about and pick up weapons, other weapons in Tribes have to be bought via a inventory station.

The number of weapons you can carry depends on your armour class: Light = 3, Medium = 4, Heavy = 5. The armour class also effects the type of equipment you'll have access to. For instance light armour does not allow you to carry and deploy portable turrets.

Anything greyed out in the inventory screen either means you already have the item, or your armour does not allow you to use it.

Remote inventory and ammo stations can be taken from an inventory station and set up else where, although they have a limited amount of energy they are useful.

Ammunition for all non-energy weapons is not unlimited so to restock you'll have to access a inventory station again, or an ammo station. You can also collect ammo off dead players by walking over them. Some players even kill themselves intentionally at the beginning of a game so that when the game actually starts they can pick up ammo from the body!

More detailed information on all the weapons available in Tribes can be found here

Wait! There's more....

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