Guide:Quick Start

Overview
Welcome to Angels Fall First! This guide is intended to get you up to speed on the mechanics of the game so you can start having fun. At first glance the interface and menus can be daunting but fear not, this guide will help!

Also check out the Beginner's Guide to AFF (of which this guide is a trimmed down and updated version), and other Steam Community Guides.

If this guide seems dauntingly large, don't worry! Read a bit, then play a bit. You'll get used to things soon enough: this guide is just to make sure you don't miss anything important while doing so!

Introduction
Angels Fall First is a first person shooter with combat taking place on ground, in the air, in space, and inside large capital ships in space.

If you're looking for some online fights, choose "Instant Play" or use the Server Browser to find a server that's to your liking. If you think you'd rather hold off on the multiplayer for now and just play against bots, select "Custom Game" and choose your settings (set your "Server Mode" to "Offline" if you don't want anyone to join).

I'd recommend a ground map for your first game.

Choose a Team and Ready Up!
First, you'll get to select a team.

The two factions, the ULA and AIA, differ in their available weaponry and vehicles. The ULA use blue armour, whereas the AIA use yellow or orange.

If your game is in the Briefing phase, you'll then be in the war room.

While in the war room, you can listen to a briefing detailing the lore behind this fight and your objectives. You can also head to the armoury to test out weapons and your loadouts.

Once you're ready to start, head back to the exit and press F to ready up.

When the game starts, you'll first select a commander. If it's your first time playing, I'd recommend leaving it to someone else or the MILNET AI (note you can only vote for people who have elected themselves).

The commander will send objectives to each squad leader with the tactical map. Squad leaders can send objectives to their subordinates as well. The top right of your screen will show the current status of the battle, as well as your assigned objective.

User Interface


The right side of the screen will show your squad, or, if you're the commander, it will show all squad leaders.

The bottom right shows your active weapon, it's firemode, ammo in magazine / spare ammo count, health, and armor.

The bottom left shows a radar, rotated to match your current heading.

The top left shows the game chat.

In the middle of the screen is your crosshair. This will expand as your weapon's spread increases due to firing, and a bar will appear and fill up if your weapon is close to overheating (if it does, you'll be unable to fire until it cools back down).

You'll also be able to see both orange, blue and red icons over player's heads. These indicate whether they are an ally, under your command, or an enemy, and the icon represents their class. A legend for these icons can be found on the tactical map (which will be properly explained later).

In Settings > UI, you can change these colours to your liking (note that this won't update straight away, but when you start your next game).

If you change weapon with the scroll wheel (or number keys), your inventory will appear at the bottom of the screen. The bars below each item indicate it's current ammo.

Units can be targetted by pressing G. This will causes a box to be drawn around them (if their location is known), and health / armor bars to appear below.

We'll get back to the space UI later, but for now: how do we even get our character into the game?

Spawning
You'll start out with some basic loadouts for your current level, so you don't have to worry about those yet.

todo

Infantry Basics
If you've ever played a first person shooter before, you should get the hang of things quickly.

If you're brand new to first person shooters:
 * you move with the WASD keys,
 * fire your weapon with left mouse,
 * can aim down your weapon's sights with right mouse,
 * change weapons with the scroll wheel or number keys (only the slots with weapons in will work),
 * can lean with Q and E,
 * sprint with the Left Shift key,
 * crouch with the Left Control key,
 * and finally jump with the Space bar.

To use wheel selections: move the mouse in the direction of the choice you want.

All the other keys you'll need are:
 * TAB to access the scoreboard
 * ESC to access the tactical map
 * G to spot
 * T for game chat
 * Y for team chat
 * U for command chat (visible to your commander and squad)
 * Z for flashlight
 * X for weapon firemode
 * hold C for a command wheel
 * hold B for the broadcast wheel (or to accept / decline vehicles quickly)

If your HUD disappears and you don't know what you pressed, press H to get it back.

You can change all keybinds in Settings > Controls

It should be noted that bullets can penetrate surfaces: thin walls might not be suitable cover against some weapons.

Weapons also have damage falloff: as you fire longer distances, the damage dealt decreases.

Your health does not regenerate in AFF, but your armour does. If you start taking damage to your health, duck into cover until your armour can regenerate. If you've taken too much damage to your health, use a medkit (if you have it equipped), press B -> Need a Medic to shout for an ally to use a medkit, or head back to a spawnpoint for a full heal and resupply.

There are also shields (available as a deployable item, and equipped as countermeasures on all vehicles), that protect against damage but slowly decay over time.

If you run out of ammo, use an ammo box (if you have it equipped), press B -> Need Ammo to shout for an ally to use an ammo box, or head back to spawn (note that if you've already gotten lots of ammo from ammo boxes, a weapon will require you to head to spawn to resupply it).

Vehicle Basics
Once you reach a certain score (or at the start of the game), you may be offered vehicles to use. You can choose whether to accept this vehicle with the broadcast menu or on the tacmap.

Accepting a vehicle will first show you it's loadout (and you can change it if you want to), and then it'll be deployed from a transport ship near a spawnpoint.

Aiming while in a vehicle only affects your weapons - it won't cause you to turn (unlike in some games). Press W and S to go forwards and backwards, and A and D to turn left or right. Left Shift will boost.

Here's all the other controls:
 * Q and E are roll left / right in aircraft / spacecraft
 * Left Control and Space are descend / ascend in air and spacecraft
 * Z will activate countermeasures (a temporary shield that can absorb damage)
 * , (comma) and . (period) can be used to change camera distance (far / close / first-person - note some vehicles don't have first-person views, and first-person will instead just be very close)
 * N and M will change seats (if the vehicle has multiple seats and allows it)
 * hold V for an autoturret settings wheel (to disable / enable autoturret firing, or set a specific target)
 * press Middle Mouse in aircraft / spacecraft to disable / enable "grav mode" - more on this later!

Some vehicles have AI controlled weapons that can optionally be manned. The autoturret system can't detect units that are further than 70% (without vehicle mods) of the weapon's range, so it may be a good idea to have allies use your turrets if you're fighting at long range. If you're trying to be stealthy, the autoturret command wheel (default V) can be used to prevent your unmanned turrets from firing. Just remember to reenable it when you need it!

Attacks to the rear and top of your vehicle will do extra damage, so it's a good idea to try and make sure you only expose your front to the enemy.

If your vehicle takes health damage, you can deploy shields with Z, pull back and repair it with the Multiwrench.

There are 5 types of ground (and air) vehicle in AFF:
 * LAVs - Light Armoured Vehicles: (ULA's Hare and AIA's Silverback)
 * Mechs: (ULA's Velius and AIA's Gheist)
 * IFVs - Infantry Fighting Vehicles: (ULA's Turtle and AIA's Basta)
 * Gunships: (ULA's Sturm and AIA's Locust)
 * Tanks (also known as MBTs - Main Battle Tanks): (ULA's Partisan and AIA's Dhaka)

LAVs are lightly armoured, but fast. Useful for providing moving fire support, or moving a small squad. You can also just park it up outside an objective and have it act as an armoured turret. LAVs have 4 seats, including driver and gunner.

Mechs are single seater walking machines with 2 weapons, one per arm. They're effective against infantry, LAVs and even potentially gunships (depending on loadout), and can jump over small obstacles. They can't be used as transport, however.

IFVs are heavy armoured transports, with more firepower and seats than an LAV. Useful for moving a large squad, or as an attack vehicle against pretty much anything (other than tanks, or a squad of anti-vehicle infantry). They can still be destroyed by focused AV fire, so be careful, and remember there's no shame in tactical retreats! IFVs have 7 seats, including driver and gunner.

Gunships are quick, flying aircraft with similar health and armour as an LAV. Their main advantage comes from their speed: maintaining a high velocity can prevent AV infantry from having time to get a guiding lock. Using Middle Mouse to enable "grav mode" will cause gravity to affect the craft: while it's off, you'll just come to a stop in the air. The ULA's Sturm Gunship has a major difference from the AIA's Locust in that it has a tailgun available: a small grenade or rocket launcher that can only be controlled by the autoturret system.

Finally, tanks. The ULA's Partisan Tank acts as a standard tank: it's main gun is a Sigurn-Fost C120, dealing high damage with a slow reload time. The Dhaka is actually a hover-tank, however: it can float over small debris without losing any speed and can strafe from side to side, but loses some top speed due to this. It uses a Tir-Boda 28 800EU plasma cannon as it's main weapon: firing two quick shots in succession before reloading for a slightly shorter period of time than an unmodified C120. These two shots do less damage than the single shot from the C120, but there's a catch: plasma weapons deal x1.5 damage to shields, so the Dhaka is more effective against infantry with deployed shields and can tear through a vehicle's countermeasure shield while they're trying to run away. Tanks also have two secondary weapons (one for the driver, one for their gunner) available, so they're no slouch when it comes to dispatching infantry either.

Space Basics
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Fighter Basics
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Dropship Basics
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Capital Ship Basics
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Gamemodes
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Progression System
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Infantry Loadouts and Weapons
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Vehicle Loadouts and Weapons
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Fighter Loadouts and Weapons
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