What sets the great player apart from the average player is learning and mastering the different tactics that can be employed in Verdun for maximizing your capabilities. These techniques have been developed over years and used by all of Verdun's top players. It's vital lower level players learn them to become great. It should go without saying that if you want accurate fire you need to be holding shift when shooting and have a stable gun. Hip fire on most weapons is a joke and you're much better off quick firing. The french rifles are the only weapons with decent hip fire.

Videos will be added to each section as they get made. For those interested in competitive Verdun registration is open for the Tournament of Champions.

When firing from an exposed position strafing is a requirement. Simply switch between holding down a and d to strafe left and right respectively. Keep the amount of time between switching directions random to make it a little harder to predict your movement. This can and should be combined with essentially every tactic below. If you're holding shift but your sights aren't stable, side strafing can be used to stabilize them.

Quick shots are the most basic Verdun firing tactic. Simply press rmb and as your character starts raising his rifle, fire. You don't need to and should not wait for your character to fully raise his gun. Even if your rifle is only slightly above your hip as soon as you pull the trigger it will jump to the correct position. You can also hold shift while pressing rmb if you need accurate quick shots. Once fired release rmb, bolt, go again. Use your crosshairs to get the next target in your sights while bolting. Your character moves faster when not aiming making quick shots incredibly useful in close quarters fighting when you need to strafe and dance to avoid enemy shots.

Crouch shots are another simple yet effective strategy. Once you've fired your weapon you crouch into cover. You should be positioned so that when standing you have a decent line of sight and when crouching you're in complete cover. If necessary you can shift this when needed so that when crouched you can fire and when prone you're in cover but it's not as effective.


After crouching, once you're bolted you can bounce back up and go for the next shot. If you're playing against better players you might want to shift right or left before popping back up as they'll probably be ready to snipe you if you've done this once or twice already. Scanning is vital to success as speed is your friend here since you want to kill your opponent immediately after popping up before he can react to you.

Jump shots are no longer nearly as effective as they once were but they are still very important to know how to do. If you know the location of the enemy then you can jump and quick shot them fairly easily. This is a fantastic way to attack enemies from positions they probably wouldn't be ready to counter. The farther away they are though the harder this gets to stay accurate. If the enemy is at a distance where you need stabilized fire then hold shift after you start jumping in order to get a stable gun. If you start aiming, hold shift, and then jump your gun will not be stable in the air.

Whenever you have a line of sight on a field of fire you need to be scanning always. Even when you're zooming in on a target getting ready to fire at them you have to be scanning for more targets. This way as soon as you fire you can immediately drop, begin bolting, adjust your crosshairs to where they'll need to be, bounce back up and quick shot the next target possibly prefiring while scanning for the next target as your gun fires.

Peeking is a way of checking halls with little risk of death. Position yourself next to a corner, strafe slightly into the hall and quickly strafe back into safety while scanning the entire time. If you just need to get information keep your weapon down for faster strafe speed, quick shot as needed. If you have a good idea of where the enemy is you can peek with your gun at the ready and quickly snipe them before they can react then strafe back into cover. The game here, as with most other tactics is speed; you have to get your shot off before they can react and if they are expecting you that can be hard. If you're fast enough then the peekers advantage will be on your side. This gets a little more dangerous the more times you do it without eliminating the enemies aware of you.

Prefiring is very important for peeking and also used quite a bit with crouch shots at shorter ranges. Prefiring is the most reliable way I've found to clear a hall of enemies waiting for you and is used in conjunction with peeking and by extension strafing. It requires you to have good knowledge of the enemy's position from previous scanning. To prefire, as you round the corner when peeking or standing up after a crouch shot, etc, fire your weapon just before you've finished strafing or standing. This will allow you to kill your opponent before they can react to your presence. This is known as the peekers advantage. So long as you act fast enough a peeker will always win against a defender as long as the defender isn't guessing your pattern and trying to counter it.

Dancing is a method of avoiding enemy fire when cover isn't available. The higher your ping the more effective this can be. There's no set way to dance, you can do pretty much anything: jump around, sprint, bunny hop, spin. A common method is to fire at the enemy, sprint in a circle as you bolt and then quick shot when bolted.

There's no rule that you need to stay in the trench; on a lot of maps you don't even need to be in the trench to capture it. Plenty of trenches can be captured from being on top of them or beside them. Once you get comfortable with the fact you don't have to stay in the trench you can start playing the enemies no mans land and fighting from above the trench.

A good way to try and avoid shots if you're running with a melee weapon is zigzagging, climbing the sides of the trenches, running on top of them, and dancing your way to your opponent to close the distance until you can stab them.

If there's a couple enemies watching a hallway shooting anyone trying to come down it, climb the side of the trench, run into no mans land, flank behind the enemy campers and shoot them in their backs. You can spend up to 10 seconds in enemy NML giving you a lot of time to do what the enemy won't expect. Another example is the central hill on the German's starting trench at Vosges. If you're playing entente and you stay in the German trench the only way up this hill is by fighting up the left side. However you can jump out of the trench into enemy NML and run right up the front and right sides of the hill attacking an angle the enemy won't be expecting and flanking the battle occurring on the left side of the hill.

Bunny hopping is a movement method slightly faster then sprinting. What makes bunny hopping valuable is the stamina conservation that comes with it. To bunny hop hold forward and start sprinting. Once your rifle shifts from the walking to running position jump. Release sprint right after you jump. Hold forward always. If you hold sprint while in the air it will continue draining your stamina. Whether you hold sprint or not you'll maintain sprint speed while in the air. Before touching the ground press and hold sprint again. When your rifle is still in it's sprint position you can press space again and repeat the process. You'll know if you're jumping correctly depending on whether or not you maintain sprint speed through the air. I'd recommend starting a private server and practicing till you get it.


Bunny hopping is not something you want to do while in danger rather it can be used when travelling through a safe trench, or if you spawn behind a friendly trench you can bunny hop to the trench and still have most of your stamina for when you reach the it. With that said there are combat applications of a bunny hop but they are very dependent on the situation. The main scenario where you might want to do a combat bunny hop is when you bunny hop into a crossroad or bend in a trench and then quick shot any surprised enemies that might be in the hall you're entering while in midair. Credit to Soren and Tossarn for this tactic.

Here's some various tips to help improve your game play. The more often a tip appears odds are the more important it is:

{Pirates} Bahman

• Use the terrain before you and learn to anticipate the opposition's moves
  
• Play against good players, force yourself to play more against them to learn their tricks
  
• Have patience, the only way to get better to keep playing other veteran players

X - BigDukeSix

• Learn the maps find routes to cross NML, speed is more important than low crawling
  
• When playing NCO focus on spawning troops forward, it's needed for a sustained attack and capping the trench especially on larger maps. Don't play NCO just for the arty
  
• The greatest weapon a player can possess is dogged tenacity, don't give up
  
• Move forward, don't camp in NML sniping, die, respawn, be agressive

Burgess

• As a squad leader I've found it very effective to use your "command aura" beacon to drop marks on your map, so you can see where your artillery is going to land, ie when you call your artillery also place a beacon where you called it in so you can see and remember where it's going to land

*IC* Diogenes

• You can catch up to your own thrown grenade

[WC] Dirty Rotten Fugger

• Crawl and use the lay of the land to effect
  
• Shoot the enemy, then move up and advance in little hops through NML
  
• Once the enemy knows you're in their trench find a choke point and kill the enemies as they walk into it

[KK] EA sucks

• No pacmanning (sticking to the inside of the trench)
  
• Flank above trenches and move around on top of them

~{1E}~ Emperor

• Always fire from the flanks when defending

H.P. Lovecraft

• Situational awareness. Just by using the mini-map you know where people are needed on defense and can figure out where a breach might be

~{1E}~ Imans

• Don't stand and shoot when out in the open
  
• When advancing stick to the flanks of the map
  
• Before entering an enemy trench make sure your weapon's fully loaded
  
• NCOs should call in their abilities as often as possible
  
• NCOs should stay outside of the enemy trench and let your squad spawn on you
  
• Communicate with your team and have fun!

CT | InsertNickName

• Stay low to the ground
  
• Watch the air and listen for incoming arty
  
• Be sure to use all your frags before you die if you have any
  
• If you're a grenadier drop a frag if you know you're gonna die
  
• Don't block doorways, sprint into allies and push them, or camp beside an mg

[LV] Iron Storm

• Communicate with your team and keep an eye on your mini-map
  
• Know when to switch load outs when you're respawning
  
• Don't rush to plug a gap in the defensive line if there's already teammates moving over there

[LV] Jack Clock

• When advancing in the trench always put mortars behind you so that it kills anyone who might spawn behind you
  
• You can do longshots with pistols but they take a lot of skill and concentration and can be dangerous to do
  
• Jump over an enemy's head when going into a trench if there is an enemy, this will confuse him and allow you to kill him with ease
  
• When using pistols aim for the head whenever you can to try and ensure a 1 hit kill
  
• Pistols are one of the few non-special weapons that can mow down enemies, I've killed groups of 6 by myself
  
• When you see a gas cloud mortar it, no questions asked
  
• When a portion of the mini-map is empty of teammates, that means you better get your ass over there and defend because all of our defenses have been killed there
  
• A close-quarters tactic I use with pistols is shooting an enemy once and then bashing him to save bullets and make less noise

[WC] KlinkaDink

• Press 4 for gas mask
  
• Make sure to hold your breath while shooting
  
• Don't run where everybody else is running unless you know it's safe
  
• Don't search definitively for a helmet and head rather shoot at movement
  
• If you spawn in a big group lookout for any MGs nearby
  
• Target their NCOs, if it's Alpenjager make sure to kill all their squad members since they are roaches

[KK] Loopy

• Don't rush madly across NML but go cover to cover
  
• Watch the timers
  
• Learn crouch, strafe shooting

{Pirates} Mors_ork

• Just keep moving, standing still is how you get shot
  
• Running up walls zigzagging is a great way to avoid getting hit
  
• Turn up your sensitivity to 5.5 moving and 6.5 aiming, it allows me to turn around really quickly
  
• Listen to foot steps, you can hear people crawling / prone really well and when you are clearing the trench it does help a lot
  
• Look at your map often to know how the trench is holding up

CT | Nazakur

• Sight lines are often a bit longer than you think they are, if you can see someone you can kill them
  
• When attacking it's always best to wait for your stamina bar to recharge in a nice crater and make short dashes to avoid being a target
  
• Always keep moving when standing, you're a bit harder to hit
  
• You can jump over the barbed wire if you hit one of the wooden pegs
  
• The thin barbed wire fences can be jumped through
  
• It's usually better to be more careful than risky, good opportunities will eventually come that are safer
  
• Know what angles you can get shot from and what angles you can shoot when you are located at particular points on the map
  
• Recognize what situations are untenable (ie when fully pinned by an mg) and know that it's not worth it to try and pop up to pick him off
  
• When you're defending don't show your head for > 3 or 4 seconds
  
• The Springfield is a laser beam of death

Notahacker

• Always find cover, peak for a second, then relocate
  
• Stay on the flanks where people don't expect to find you, then the enemies easy pickings
  
• Stay on top of the trenches
  
• Use Rifle Death Match to improve your aim

CT | Shadowstep

• Aim at people and shoot them, as long as you're holding shift if you can see someone you can kill them

{Pirates} Silent Assassin

• Don't rush the spawn points, check your surroundings first
  
• Use all available angles when attacking a trench, the less used a path or location the less likely the enemy will be ready for you

*IC* Smiledozer

• When searching for a firing spot, note that the most obvious spots (A pile of rocks, a group of trees, etc.) will always make the best sniping positions
  
• Make sure that the enemy is going to have a tough time spotting you when you pop up from cover
  
• Find a spot close to where the enemy always attacks and wait. I.e., the enemy generally attacks across one swath of ground; wait for them. They'll most likely attack there again.
  
• Don't stay in one spot for too long. Snipers and riflemen who don't change positions after firing off a few rounds will find themselves, in turn, shot.
  
• Just remember, be quick or be dead! Have fun, be patient, and communicate with your squad and victory will be yours

Sneaky Grandpa

• Strafing saves lives
  
• When clearing or defending a trench try jumping out of the trench and attacking from unorthodox angles, people will be looking down the trenches for enemies, generally not above

[DEV] Volcol

• If you can take your time then getting the extra bit of of stability can make the difference between a hit and a kill
  
• Where possible reload after a single rifle shot

These techniques should be stiched together into smooth actions. Quick shot, crouch, bolt, strafe right, pop up, quick shot, crouch, bolt, strafe left, jump shot, win. Practice your combat techniques in squad defense and then dominate in pvp.

Those looking for furthering reading that goes more indepth into Verdun gameplay I'd recommending checking out Jackhuahua's Field Guideand Metalcallous's Veteran Verdun Tactics.