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Rainbow Six 3: Raven Shield (PC)
General Planning Advice
Document written by PyroFalkon (pyrofalkon@hotmail.com)
Latest update: 23 April 2003
Current version: 1
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||LATEST UPDATE||
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v1 (23 April 2003)
First release, and finished for now, but this guide will never be "done." If
you have something to add, feel free to submit!
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||INTRO||
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I love Rainbow Six, and I hate most first-person shooters. Hypocritical?
Maybe. But I'm telling you, I would not even considering picking up Rainbow
Six if the whole planning thing wasn't in it. Maybe I just like tactical
shooters, I don't know. But, with the planning phase of the game in it, the
game shoots to somewhere near the top of my favorite games of all time.
There aren't too many games where I'd honestly claim to have spent over six
hours on the first mission, spending 10 minutes of that simply testing the
movement of one waypoint, but here we are.
When I was a rookie, back with Rainbow Six 1, I still loved the planning
phase, but I had no idea how to go about using it. I knew the CONTROLS, of
course, but not the strategy. In one brilliant moment, for example, I sent
all four teams of two into one door at once and told them to shoot
everything that moved. They opened the door, saw a terrorist, and opened
fire. The terrorist survived because my team was too busy shooting each
other in the heads. When the blood settled, two guys were left. One ran like
hell, and the other was blown away by the terrorist. Not exactly the best
way to handle a hostage situation.
That would not have happened if I had had any training at all in how to plan
for missions. There are plenty of FAQs out there, both online and off, that
talk about how to get through every mission. I don't like having my plans
handed to me, though, so I looked for a guide that gave general pointers and
advice. I didn't find one, so instead of whining about it on a message
board, I decided to write one.
Let me say up front that if you follow every tactic of mine to the letter,
you'll get blown away in every mission. It's not because I'm inaccurate,
it's because I'm intentionally vague. The information presented here is only
a SHELL. Every mission is different, of course, so some things may work in
some situations while others won't. You need to use this document as advice
or a training tool only, not as your be-all and end-all advice to getting
through the game. You'll understand in a moment, once you get to the meat of
the document.
This guide will probably not help veterans, at least not as much as it would
help rookies. We vets have played through this series, fiddling with
waypoints and go-codes until we had to program our cell phones to say
"Alpha! Go go go!" whenever we had a phone call just so we would pay
attention. We know, through a trial by fire, not to send in eight operatives
through the same door. We know not to throw a frag grenade in the same room
we're standing in. As a former rookie though (and we're all former rookies,
don't forget that), I know that I was ill-prepared for the planning stages
of the game.
That said, vets may want to have a glance at this document anyway. Maybe you
forgot something, or maybe you never tried one strategy simply because it
may have slipped your mind. Or, even better, feel free to submit your own
general tactic to me. I hardly know EVERYTHING in Rainbow, and there's
infinite ways to improve upon my techniques. More information can be found
in the contact info section at the bottom.
There are no spoilers here. I may cite a mission number as a reference, but
I won't give away its name or its details. You won't ruin your gaming
experience or the storyline by reading this.
Finally, for rookies and vets alike, I offer a link to my website. It has
for your downloading pleasure a CD-quality MP3 of the Rainbow Six 3 theme
song. It's only two minutes long, and therefore not even 2 MB in size. Head
to http://www.geocities.com/pyrofalkon/ or
http://www.angelfire.com/games5/pyrofalkon and click the appropriate link on
the main page.
All right, onto the strategies!
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||GENERAL TACTICS||
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This is the meat of the document. I make no guarantee (in fact, I highly
doubt) that every tactic will work in every mission. I try to be as vague as
possible to show that it can work in MOST missions, but there are some
things that just won't work in some situations. None of the attacking
strategies will work in the recon mission, for example. (Who's stupid idea
was it to put that mission in the game, anyway?)
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|TACTIC 1: LOOK BEFORE YOU LEAP|
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Although John Clark, Kevin Sweeney, and Control know the general situation
of a given mission, they don't tell you every little thing to expect. The
video you view in the briefing screen is helpful too, marking the tension
zones and all that, but it still doesn't give you a clear picture. Why then
would want to pick your team BEFORE KNOWING THE EXACT WORKINGS OF THE AREA?
After you get done on the briefing screen, don't go to the team select
screen. Instead, head to the planning screen and take a look at the area.
The big questions you need to ask yourself are: Are there any good sniping
points? Are there any wide open areas that provide little to no cover? Are
there any cross-fire ambush points between buildings or furniture?
Also look to see if there are any rooms where only one door is covered.
There are many rooms in many missions where entering from one door will get
you killed, but the other door gives you a clear shot of your enemy.
There are also missions where one door is covered from a higher point. It's
a hell of a lot easier to shoot down than it is up, so you want to avoid
entering a room if someone above you has a clear view... but we'll get into
the finer points of that in a second.
Once you have a good idea of your location, THEN proceed to the team screen.
This is a nice segue to my next topic.
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|TACTIC 2: BAD TEAMS HURT WORSE THAN THE ENEMY|
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Basically, you want your team to play the map, not have the map play the
team. Sniping points aren't just good for the terrorists, they're fantastic
for your men and women. However, if you do find the world's most perfect
sniping point, it ain't gonna be of much use to a demo or recon specialist.
You viewed the map first (you did, right?), so you know where the open areas
and snipers points and such are. If you spotted a great sniping point that
you know you can clear, get a two-man team as a sniper team. If there are no
such points, then don't waste your time getting a sniper team in order,
since it will be of little use. You can only have eight people, remember,
and it's better to have eight assault specialists than seven assault and one
sniper if you're fighting indoors.
If bombs and/or electronic devices are a part of the mission, then assign
the appropriate specialists, but don't go nuts. Early in the campaign,
you'll encounter your first bomb-defusing mission. You don't need ANY demo
specialists (since you can just kill one guy and to defuse all bombs and not
even have to worry about it). If you insist on having a demo guy, though
(which is good practice anyway), only have him on a one- or two-man team.
When you've got four assault guys with assault ratings of over 97, it would
be silly to drop one of them in favor of a demo guy who will only have a
three-bomb task.
Once you know who you're taking, spread them out appropriately. I used to
think that more people and teams were always better, but I've since learned
that that's not always the case. More people increase the chance that
someone will get hit in a firefight, and more teams can just add to
confusion when missions go to hell. If you have one team (or, even better,
one operative), you have a lot less to worry about.
That said, don't go into a map with too weak of a force. If you have the
accuracy and ammo to do the lone wolf thing, fine. But under most
circumstances, sending in only one dude is suicidal. You have to find the
balance between maneuverability and strength, and unfortunately that
normally requires you to play and lose a mission several times.
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|TACTIC 3: STANDARD OPERATING PROCEDURES|
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From the outset of the game (and by that, I mean mission #1, and NO LATER),
you need to set some standards for yourself, and the team select screen is
the best place to do it.
I put teams on the color based on their role in the mission. That way, I can
tell in an instant who's doing what. For example, if I need a sniping team,
it's always a two-man team assigned to gold. The two men are a sniper and an
assault specialist, and the leader is whoever has the higher leadership
skill, even if I'm going to play that team and it won't matter. With that in
mind, I can enter the mission as a team other than gold, and if I hear,
"Gold, man down!," I know I'm screwed because we've got other a sniper or an
assault specialist on his own, and I don't even have to look at the team
status in the bottom-right corner of the screen.
My red team is the team with Ding Chavez, and is nine times out of the ten
the team with the hardest goals to accomplish. Along with that, of course,
comes the fact that it normally has the most people. I usually don't play as
the red team; I trust that Ding leads the team correctly every time. Usually
if it dies, it's because of my planning, not a lack of AI on the part of the
computer.
My green team is the hybrid team. Sometimes it has a sniper, sometimes a
demo expert, sometimes it has four people, sometimes three, whatever the
situation calls for. If green team is near red team, chances are that green
is in a support role. It's not unheard of for me to give a hostage to green
for rescue, but I usually reserve that for red.
You may have entirely different ideas on how your colors should be assigned,
and that's fine. The point though, is that if you are consistent with the
way you assign teams and team colors, you're better organized once the fight
commences, and usually the side with better organization is going to come
out on top.
Speaking of organization, let me bring up my gold team again. Never, and I
mean NEVER put a sniper by his lonesome. Even if that sniper is going to sit
in one spot for the whole mission, it's better that the other two teams go
in with six men between them than leave the sniper's back exposed. If you
play as the sniper, you'll see how little of the land you actually get to
see when you're looking through that scope. There's no way you can defend
yourself from a blind spot, so your allies in that team will help you out.
In mission 2, there's one attic where I always send a sniper, and one time I
sent him in alone. A terrorist climbed the ladder, but I didn't hear him,
and he scared me out of my wits when he plugged me in the head. With an
ally, my friend would have blown away the terrorist the moment his shiny
bald head peeked from the edge of the ladder, and I would have been fine.
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|TACTIC 4: THE RIGHT TOOLS FOR THE JOB|
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Just as you wouldn't bring in a sniper if you're fighting indoors, you
shouldn't come with nothing but pistols if you're in open areas. Missions
can be won or lost simply by what you equip your men and women with prior to
engagement.
The first thing you need to decide is how much firepower you want to bring
to the table. If you're against unarmored enemies, then it's not necessary
to bring along assault rifles. Submachine guns with hollow-point rounds are
fantastic in the early missions; it doesn't take too many rounds to floor a
baddie, even with a weak weapon.
If you've got a sniper rifle, you need to consider stability. On mission 3,
my favorite sniping spot is in an attic, shooting almost straight down
through a window. That makes me run into problems, because I have to stand
to get the right angle. As such, I use the PSG-1 because of its stability.
If you're going to be on a flatter area, then you can go with something more
high-powered.
Beyond the weapons themselves, you have to think about the optional parts.
In mission 1, and any other mission where stealth is not important, then you
generally don't need to suppress your weapons. Although enemies will hear
gunshots and come running, I would rather face a couple more enemies with a
higher powered firearm than face only a couple with a weaker version.
Remember, suppressors absolutely kill the damage and range ratings of a
weapon, and that's murder (literally) in open areas. Suppressing assault
rifles especially make them all but worthless.
In hostage situations, though, just the opposite is true. In Raven Shield,
the terrorists sometimes blow away hostages simply because they HEAR you.
Some terrorists will even hear you, run away, tell the hostage keepers
you've arrived, and then the hostage keepers will do the dirty work. You
can't run that risk.
Beyond that, though, you need to know what your teams are doing. If you have
a specific team that rescues the hostages, you can outfit THEM with
suppressors, but let the other two teams go with loud versions. Snipers
especially seem hampered with suppressed sniper rifles, and light machine
guns can't even HAVE suppressors. You can still use unsuppressed weapons in
hostage missions, you just can't use them AROUND the hostages.
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|TACTIC 5: USING MOVEMENT AND ROE EFFECTIVELY|
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There are nine possible combinations that dictate how a team acts and
reacts. The three movement rates--blitz, normal, and cautious--can be
combined with any of the three rules of engagement--assault, infiltrate, and
recon.
You need to select the combination based on the teams objective. For the
most part, assault/normal is all you'll need. There's not too many missions
where you shouldn't fire at any enemy you see, and there's usually little
reason to change your movement.
However, when the situation calls for it, don't be afraid to change the way
the team works. If I'm in a big area with little cover, I use
assault/cautious. Cautious tells your people to crouch as they move, making
them smaller targets for enemy snipers. If there is a lot of cover, I use
assault/blitz so they quickly move from obstacle to obstacle, constantly
keeping boxes or planes or whatever between them and the enemy.
There are a couple of situations where recon and infiltrate will be
necessary, but you probably won't want the computer to control those teams
anyway when it happens. To avoid spoiling the plot and missions, I won't go
into the details about that.
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|TACTIC 6: ORDERS|
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For the most part, your computer-controlled teams will do what they're told.
The problem with that is they won't contest mistakes on your part... that's
part of the game, though.
I breach, bang, flash, gas, and smoke rooms as I need to. However, I always
use those as my last option (with the exception of breaching; I'll explain
why in a moment). Remember, in order for an operative to use a grenade, s/he
has to take the time to: 1) Stop firing, 2) Put away the weapon, 3) Pull out
the grenade, 4) Pull the pin, 5) Throw the grenade, 6) Put away the grenade,
7) Pull the weapon back out, and 8) Aim before s/he is able to attack again.
That's a LOT of time for an operative to be defenseless. Yeah, I know he's
got cover usually, but a terrorist loves aiming at the defenseless guy for
obvious reasons. If you're standing face-to-face with a terrorist, and
you're dumb enough to drop your weapon in favor of pulling a grenade or
something, you might as well paint a big target on your face.
That's why, for the most part, it's better to storm a room with your gun
out. You may not have the shock value a well-placed flashbang would do, but
at least you won't have to worry about being picked off by an enemy while
you're standing there fumbling with the grenade.
Feel free to give the team an order to frag or bang a room or area if you
know they're well covered and have the time. However, don't put too much
stock into it; remember, they're not smart enough to open doors a crack.
Smoking an area is something else, but they won't wait for the smoke to
thicken before running to the next waypoint without a little control on your
part. I explain that in a moment too.
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|TACTIC 7: THERE IS NO "I" IN "TEAM"|
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This isn't Metal Gear Solid. You have a team of elite agents, not just one,
to perform these missions. Coordinating the whole team is one of the biggest
parts of the planning phase, and as I've said before, generally the most
organized team gets the win.
If there's a room to storm, take note of its potential ambush points. There
might be a little homemade barricade of tables and barrels facing one door,
but not the other. However, that other door might be covered by a forklift,
although the guy behind that has his back to the first door. If one team
enters the room from one side, they'll be picked off. But if two teams enter
both doors at the same time, both tangos will be kissing the ground before
they can utter a profane word.
Whether by accident or intentional design (I'm betting on the latter),
terrorists don't know who to pick off first if they're presented with two
targets that are on opposite sides of the room. They take the time to select
one target and aim, and by that time, they're normally dead. Your operatives
are the same way, although you should never end up in a situation where that
happens.
If there is a room with multiple entrances, usually the best way to clear it
is to have two or three teams storm it together. That alone eliminates a lot
of ambush potential because the enemy won't know who to attack first, and
again that split second delay is all you'll need. It also guarantees that no
one else will get the jump on your people from the back or from another door
while the firefight is going on.
In the last section, I mentioned that breaching is the only thing I'll do to
a room if I don't have to. The reason is because a breaching charge will not
only take down anyone standing too close to the door, it will confuse the
heck out of tangos (again, I'm not sure whether that was accidental or
intentional design). In mission 1, my favorite part is when we're on the top
floor, and I breach a room from each of its three doors. The tangos have no
idea who to aim at first, and my guys take out all threats before they can
blink. THAT'S efficiency.
Generally speaking, if a room does have multiple entrance points, there is
no better tactic than to breach all doors and run in, guns blazing. The
tangos won't see it coming, and the element of surprise is what separates
clean kills from all-out firefights.
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|TACTIC 8: WHAT YOU CAN'T SEE CAN HURT YOU|
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In a game that touts "one-shot, one-kill lethality," you don't have the time
to run to a spot, crouch twice, pull out your primary gun, get set, zoom in,
turn on the thermal scope, find the target, double-check your aim, and pull
the trigger. By that time, you or a teammate (or both) may be taking dirt
naps.
However, by the same account, the enemies are in the same boat. Even on the
hardest difficulty settings, enemies cannot see through walls and other
objects. They may have no idea that you're crouched behind the corner, just
waiting to see some flesh that you can put a few slabs of lead into. They
don't normally have the luxury of getting set if you're on your game, and
like the old Texas shoot-outs, whoever gets the first shot off normally
wins.
I have several tactics I like using to splatter an enemy's brains all over
the walls before he knew what hit him. With the induction of the fluid open
and close of doors via the mouse wheel, you can be pretty forward without
endangering yourself. In mission one, I suspected an enemy was through a
door (I didn't have a Heartbeat Sensor equipped, so I wasn't sure). The room
was small, but I didn't want to endanger myself by opening the door, so I
equipped my frags and opened it a crack. I heard the terrorist say "Hello?"
and immediately pulled the pin. I threw it in the room, closed the door, and
backed up a step. Two seconds later, that terrorist was shaking Satan's
hand.
You don't have to frag a room to make an entrance though. Banging a room can
be just as effective, especially with the above tactic. Flashbangs don't
affect you or your team one iota if the explosion happened in the next room
and the adjacent door was closed. Once I opened the door a crack, tossed in
a flashbang, slammed the door, then busted in as soon as I heard the
explosion. The terrorist had his back to us, aiming at the window that lead
to a brick wall, and he had no idea what hit him.
That's all well and good for close quarters, but what about long-range
areas? In the opening paragraph to this section, I cited a situation that
you will encounter early on in the campaign. There's two insertion zones in
an early mission, one of which has just one path leading from it, and that
one path is being watched by an enemy sniper. The default plan that ships
with the game has the sniper team bang the area before running there to
snipe. That's all well and good, I suppose, but the problem is that
flashbangs have to be damn close to the target to work. If you're a mile
away, you can stare at the flashbang and not be affected. Instead of
distracting the enemy, all you'll do is attract unwanted attention.
There's a much better solution. A combination of smoke grenades and the
thermal scope of a sniper rifle can do amazing things. Although night-vision
goggles can't see through smoke, thermal goggles CAN because the smoke gives
off no heat. My solution to that sniper dilemma was to smoke the area, then
run in, go prone, and aim my sniper rifle. I zoomed in, turned on the
thermal scope, and viola! That enemy sniper was looking at the smoke, but
didn't know what to make of it. The next thing he knew, he had a bullet in
his eye. Some nearby guards heard the commotion and came to investigate, and
I picked them off too because that smoke cloud had not yet gone away.
Only try this exact tactic if you're going to control the sniper. Auto-aim
does not take into account the thermal scope, only what you can actually see
with your naked eyes. So, even if you have everything working perfectly,
you'll still need to manually target the enemy. The computer is also not
smart enough to use thermal goggles through a smoke screen, although they
USUALLY (note that I did NOT say "always") see a terrorist through the
disappearing smoke before the terrorist see them. I've extensively tested
whether my computer-controlled sniper did as good of a job as I did in this
situation, and I found that only 5 times out of 10 did she manage to kill
the enemy sniper with one round, and only 7 of the 10 times did she kill the
enemy before he took down one of my men. Considering she could have used the
thermal scope like I did, that's hideous.
That doesn't mean that the computer is WORTHLESS using this tactic though.
That ugly percentage is based on only one specific situation in one specific
mission. If you give your CPU-controlled team to smoke an area, then you
have them set up to snipe there, they normally do so with little problem.
They have no concept of time, though, and they'll smoke an area and run to
the spot before the smoke has had a chance to get thick. To fix that, have
them throw the smoke grenade from a distance, then tell them to move
cautiously to the point at which you want them to snipe. That will usually
buy the smoke grenade enough time to fully obscure the team from the prying
eyes of the terrorists, at least until the sniper can set himself.
Speaking of the thermal scope, though, there's another issue with it that
you have to take into account. Windows block heat, no matter how close the
target or the sniper is. If the window is close to you, you may want to
avoid using the thermal scope long enough to make sure there is no tango in
your immediate sights. If you have a chance, blow out the window with a
sniper round or pistol round. That might attract attention, but at least
you're expecting it, and then you can actually use the thermal scope.
Remember, if the smoke grenade is still active, you can blow out a window
without compromising your position. The enemy may understand that there's a
threat, but he won't have any idea where it's coming from.
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|TACTIC 9: THE WALLS HAVE EYES, NOT JUST EARS|
+--------------------------------------------+
Terrorists in Raven Shield are not the mindless enemies that games once
showed back in the days of Doom and Duke Nuke 'Em. If they hear or see
things happen, they will take action. Keep that in mind when you're planning
a mission.
In mission 5, there's a room with a hostage, and it overlooks a room with a
patrolling tango. In one of my first attempts, I had my team blow that
patrolling guy away in full view of the window. The guards upstairs saw him
fall, so they calmly turned and blew away the hostage. Mission failed.
If your team is near hostages, make sure that not only are they using
silenced weapons, they're also in areas away from windows. Try to get angles
so you can take down enemies without them being seen by their buddies, but
still make sure you CAN take them down. I don't like settling on letting a
tango go in favor of killing him in view of another tango, because that one
you allowed to get away might set up an ambush or get help.
A terrorist's hearing isn't too shabby either. I've seen situations in the
game where the enemy is stupid (to paraphrase and testify to PC Gamer, I
once had a mission where a terrorist thought it would be a good idea to
check out a recent grenade explosion), but for the most part they know what
to do when a situation arises. If they hear gunshots, they'll either come
and help out their buddies, or they'll run and wait for you to be caught
off-guard.
As I said in the equipment tactic, suppression is not always necessary. If
you EXPECT other enemies to come and assist, then you really won't be in too
bad of a situation. Before you pull the trigger, make sure you know all the
ways enemies can attack you, and know what your teammates are doing. If you
have a three- or four-man team, you won't have to worry about your tail, and
possibly not your side. If you're looking at the only way in or out of the
room, feel free to light up anyone you see. Even if the enemy gets help,
you'll be prepared for it.
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|TACTIC 10: COVER ME!|
+--------------------+
When things turn violent, your team focuses on their current task. That
means if they're storming a room, they'll STORM THE ROOM and to hell with
everything else. There have been times were my guys stormed a room and
didn't pay attention to the door they entered from until a terrorist snuck
in from the back and planted a few slugs in Rainbow's plans.
Although your guys normally have one member covering the team's tail,
there's no way he can handle an onslaught of enemies. If there's only one
door into a room, or if it's not prudent or possible to send in more than
one team, that doesn't make the other team worthless.
I'll cite mission 4 as an example again. A hostage is being held in a room
that has two doors, but according to my plan, I don't want to send anyone
through that second door (it would require sending that team into a
dangerous open area, something I'm just not comfortable doing). Because my
guys are using suppressed weapons around the hostage, though, no one will
enter through that door because they won't hear anything. However, a
patrolling tango below might hear what's going on, and he'll come up to
investigate.
In that situation, my hostage rescue team is screwed because they won't be
watching the door they entered from. They'll be too busy clearing the room
and securing the hostage to watch their six, and that spells trouble. To
remedy that, I use a second team to watch the staircase that leads to the
door to that room. That way, if a terrorist things it will be a good idea to
shoot up my main team's back, the cover team will put a quick stop to it.
In other mission, I kept finding that as I led the hostages from their pen
to the extraction zone, enemies would pour through one particular door and
slaughter me to pieces. I pass that door on the way to the pen, but it's
closed and I go unnoticed on my way through. Once I start heading back
though, everyone knows I'm here, and they know how to stop me. My solution
was to get another team to constantly watch that door after I passed it. The
next time I went tried it, they did indeed try to cut me off, but they never
expected that cover man to take them out.
Cover teams are tricky, though. If you implement one, you have to prepare
it. If you think that they'll only have to cover one or two tangos, a sniper
can do the trick. I find it best though to have my cover teams made of one
man who carries a light machine gun. With 100-round magazines, he can last
on his own for quite a long time if the enemies bottleneck at a doorway or
other such obstacle.
Get friendly with the way the snipe order works. If a team gets a snipe
order but has no sniper, it chooses its best sniper of the group, sets his
weapon to single-shot mode if he can, and he concentrates on his sights at
the target. This doesn't have much value with submachine guns, but if you
give a snipe order to a guy with a light machine gun, he'll have the
stopping power to cover an area for a long time. Giving such an order in a
hallway or at a doorway, as I just talked about, is a heck of a combination.
Normally I say that snipers should be two-man teams, but if you've got a
sniper as a cover man ONLY, then he might be able to get away with being
solo. Still, I would prefer giving a solo guy a light machine gun over a
sniper rifle any day.
An extremely effective strategy is to have two teams breach a room while
having a third as a cover. This confuses the enemies in the target room,
making them ripe for shooting, but also removes the possibility of the teams
getting jumped from behind. I find that I get consistent, good results using
cover teams for practically every single room breach. It takes longer, but
my mission success rate has gone up.
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|TACTIC 11: LEARNING FROM YOUR MISTAKES|
+--------------------------------------+
You will lose your first mission. Even if you manage to eliminate every
tango in the first level, you will lose at least one team member. You will
never have a plan that will ALWAYS work. That's the randomness of the game.
The thing to remember is that, until you find a plan that CONSISTENTLY
works, you'll be in a learning stage. I never take mission failures as
defeat, only as lessons. If my red team keeps getting slaughtered in one
building, I'll try to approach it differently. If my gold team can't snipe
from their location, even after setting up the smoke grenade, I'll scrap
that team and try a different waypoint with an assault team. If my green
team can't rescue the hostage because they're taking too long setting up the
breach, I'll go in without any explosives.
Observer mode is fantastic because you can see exactly where missions go to
hell. Once you go back to the planning stage, change the waypoint or RoE or
movement or SOMETHING at that point. Don't neglect what works, however; if
one team is constantly getting its job done, don't mess with it.
Know when problems you encounter are just coincidences. I have a plan on the
first stage that will nine times out of ten work without any member of my
team taking a bullet. However, sometimes as they enter one particular room,
a terrorist who isn't always in an overlooking room will spot them and lob a
grenade that they won't have time to react to.
If you have some sort of bad situation that you've only seen once in that
location, it probably won't happen enough to change the plan. Sometimes you
just need to Retry Action once or twice, and the same plan that's failed
will work smoothly. What you're looking for is consistency, a plan that will
USUALLY succeed with minimal losses. Note that finding that plan may take
hours and hours of work.
And in the end, that's what I love about Rainbow Six. There aren't too many
games where I spend far more time planning than I do actually playing. With
enough practice, and enough tweaking to your own strategies, you'll be
stopping terrorists and bringing honor and pride to Rainbow in no time.
+--------------+
|+------------+|
||CONTRIBUTORS||
|+------------+|
+--------------+
If you wish to contribute a tactic of your own, please e-mail me. I'll post
it with all due credit.
+-----------------+
|+---------------+|
||VERSION HISTORY||
|+---------------+|
+-----------------+
v1 (23 April 2003)
First release, and finished for now, but this guide will never be "done." If
you have something to add, feel free to submit!
+----------------+
|+--------------+|
||COPYRIGHT INFO||
|+--------------+|
+----------------+
An HTML version of this guide can be found at my website, listed near the
bottom of this document.
This document is copyright 2003 for J. "PyroFalkon" Habib. If you plan to
use any of it as part of another FAQ, you need my permission first. However,
if you plan to post it on a website or e-mail it to someone or whatnot, you
may do so without my permission AS LONG AS IT IS NOT ALTERED IN ANY WAY. I'd
like you to drop me an e-mail so I know where you're going to take it, but I
will not require you to do so. You may download it or print it at your
leisure.
The most updated version will always be found at these sites:
http://www.gamefaqs.com/
http://www.geocities.com/pyrofalkon/
Other sites may have up-to-date versions, but check GameFAQs or my website
first.
+--------------+
|+------------+|
||CONTACT INFO||
|+------------+|
+--------------+
If any information is incorrect, or you wish to submit something, please
e-mail me. My address is found on the bottom of the FAQ. Credit will be
given where it's due.
I encourage you to send me some strategies of your own. However, they MUST
BE GENERAL TACTICS. If they can only relate to a couple missions, then I
won't accept it. Understand that just because you send me something, I do
have the right to reject it for whatever reason I choose (although if I do
reject it, I'll send you a reply telling you why).
If you submit something to me, I will credit you by the name you signed in
the message body or by the name attached to your e-mail. I will also post
your e-mail address unless you specifically tell me not to.
If you wish to be e-mailed when this FAQ is updated, send your request to
me. If you have a junk mail protector on your e-mail program, make sure you
put my e-mail address on the safe list, or my messages may not get through.
http://www.geocities.com/pyrofalkon/
pyrofalkon@hotmail.com
Good luck in Rainbow Six 3: Raven Shield, and may all your operatives get
out of their missions without taking one round.
General Planning Advice
Document written by PyroFalkon (pyrofalkon@hotmail.com)
Latest update: 23 April 2003
Current version: 1
+---------------+
|+-------------+|
||LATEST UPDATE||
|+-------------+|
+---------------+
v1 (23 April 2003)
First release, and finished for now, but this guide will never be "done." If
you have something to add, feel free to submit!
+-------+
|+-----+|
||INTRO||
|+-----+|
+-------+
I love Rainbow Six, and I hate most first-person shooters. Hypocritical?
Maybe. But I'm telling you, I would not even considering picking up Rainbow
Six if the whole planning thing wasn't in it. Maybe I just like tactical
shooters, I don't know. But, with the planning phase of the game in it, the
game shoots to somewhere near the top of my favorite games of all time.
There aren't too many games where I'd honestly claim to have spent over six
hours on the first mission, spending 10 minutes of that simply testing the
movement of one waypoint, but here we are.
When I was a rookie, back with Rainbow Six 1, I still loved the planning
phase, but I had no idea how to go about using it. I knew the CONTROLS, of
course, but not the strategy. In one brilliant moment, for example, I sent
all four teams of two into one door at once and told them to shoot
everything that moved. They opened the door, saw a terrorist, and opened
fire. The terrorist survived because my team was too busy shooting each
other in the heads. When the blood settled, two guys were left. One ran like
hell, and the other was blown away by the terrorist. Not exactly the best
way to handle a hostage situation.
That would not have happened if I had had any training at all in how to plan
for missions. There are plenty of FAQs out there, both online and off, that
talk about how to get through every mission. I don't like having my plans
handed to me, though, so I looked for a guide that gave general pointers and
advice. I didn't find one, so instead of whining about it on a message
board, I decided to write one.
Let me say up front that if you follow every tactic of mine to the letter,
you'll get blown away in every mission. It's not because I'm inaccurate,
it's because I'm intentionally vague. The information presented here is only
a SHELL. Every mission is different, of course, so some things may work in
some situations while others won't. You need to use this document as advice
or a training tool only, not as your be-all and end-all advice to getting
through the game. You'll understand in a moment, once you get to the meat of
the document.
This guide will probably not help veterans, at least not as much as it would
help rookies. We vets have played through this series, fiddling with
waypoints and go-codes until we had to program our cell phones to say
"Alpha! Go go go!" whenever we had a phone call just so we would pay
attention. We know, through a trial by fire, not to send in eight operatives
through the same door. We know not to throw a frag grenade in the same room
we're standing in. As a former rookie though (and we're all former rookies,
don't forget that), I know that I was ill-prepared for the planning stages
of the game.
That said, vets may want to have a glance at this document anyway. Maybe you
forgot something, or maybe you never tried one strategy simply because it
may have slipped your mind. Or, even better, feel free to submit your own
general tactic to me. I hardly know EVERYTHING in Rainbow, and there's
infinite ways to improve upon my techniques. More information can be found
in the contact info section at the bottom.
There are no spoilers here. I may cite a mission number as a reference, but
I won't give away its name or its details. You won't ruin your gaming
experience or the storyline by reading this.
Finally, for rookies and vets alike, I offer a link to my website. It has
for your downloading pleasure a CD-quality MP3 of the Rainbow Six 3 theme
song. It's only two minutes long, and therefore not even 2 MB in size. Head
to http://www.geocities.com/pyrofalkon/ or
http://www.angelfire.com/games5/pyrofalkon and click the appropriate link on
the main page.
All right, onto the strategies!
+-----------------+
|+---------------+|
||GENERAL TACTICS||
|+---------------+|
+-----------------+
This is the meat of the document. I make no guarantee (in fact, I highly
doubt) that every tactic will work in every mission. I try to be as vague as
possible to show that it can work in MOST missions, but there are some
things that just won't work in some situations. None of the attacking
strategies will work in the recon mission, for example. (Who's stupid idea
was it to put that mission in the game, anyway?)
+------------------------------+
|TACTIC 1: LOOK BEFORE YOU LEAP|
+------------------------------+
Although John Clark, Kevin Sweeney, and Control know the general situation
of a given mission, they don't tell you every little thing to expect. The
video you view in the briefing screen is helpful too, marking the tension
zones and all that, but it still doesn't give you a clear picture. Why then
would want to pick your team BEFORE KNOWING THE EXACT WORKINGS OF THE AREA?
After you get done on the briefing screen, don't go to the team select
screen. Instead, head to the planning screen and take a look at the area.
The big questions you need to ask yourself are: Are there any good sniping
points? Are there any wide open areas that provide little to no cover? Are
there any cross-fire ambush points between buildings or furniture?
Also look to see if there are any rooms where only one door is covered.
There are many rooms in many missions where entering from one door will get
you killed, but the other door gives you a clear shot of your enemy.
There are also missions where one door is covered from a higher point. It's
a hell of a lot easier to shoot down than it is up, so you want to avoid
entering a room if someone above you has a clear view... but we'll get into
the finer points of that in a second.
Once you have a good idea of your location, THEN proceed to the team screen.
This is a nice segue to my next topic.
+---------------------------------------------+
|TACTIC 2: BAD TEAMS HURT WORSE THAN THE ENEMY|
+---------------------------------------------+
Basically, you want your team to play the map, not have the map play the
team. Sniping points aren't just good for the terrorists, they're fantastic
for your men and women. However, if you do find the world's most perfect
sniping point, it ain't gonna be of much use to a demo or recon specialist.
You viewed the map first (you did, right?), so you know where the open areas
and snipers points and such are. If you spotted a great sniping point that
you know you can clear, get a two-man team as a sniper team. If there are no
such points, then don't waste your time getting a sniper team in order,
since it will be of little use. You can only have eight people, remember,
and it's better to have eight assault specialists than seven assault and one
sniper if you're fighting indoors.
If bombs and/or electronic devices are a part of the mission, then assign
the appropriate specialists, but don't go nuts. Early in the campaign,
you'll encounter your first bomb-defusing mission. You don't need ANY demo
specialists (since you can just kill one guy and to defuse all bombs and not
even have to worry about it). If you insist on having a demo guy, though
(which is good practice anyway), only have him on a one- or two-man team.
When you've got four assault guys with assault ratings of over 97, it would
be silly to drop one of them in favor of a demo guy who will only have a
three-bomb task.
Once you know who you're taking, spread them out appropriately. I used to
think that more people and teams were always better, but I've since learned
that that's not always the case. More people increase the chance that
someone will get hit in a firefight, and more teams can just add to
confusion when missions go to hell. If you have one team (or, even better,
one operative), you have a lot less to worry about.
That said, don't go into a map with too weak of a force. If you have the
accuracy and ammo to do the lone wolf thing, fine. But under most
circumstances, sending in only one dude is suicidal. You have to find the
balance between maneuverability and strength, and unfortunately that
normally requires you to play and lose a mission several times.
+---------------------------------------+
|TACTIC 3: STANDARD OPERATING PROCEDURES|
+---------------------------------------+
From the outset of the game (and by that, I mean mission #1, and NO LATER),
you need to set some standards for yourself, and the team select screen is
the best place to do it.
I put teams on the color based on their role in the mission. That way, I can
tell in an instant who's doing what. For example, if I need a sniping team,
it's always a two-man team assigned to gold. The two men are a sniper and an
assault specialist, and the leader is whoever has the higher leadership
skill, even if I'm going to play that team and it won't matter. With that in
mind, I can enter the mission as a team other than gold, and if I hear,
"Gold, man down!," I know I'm screwed because we've got other a sniper or an
assault specialist on his own, and I don't even have to look at the team
status in the bottom-right corner of the screen.
My red team is the team with Ding Chavez, and is nine times out of the ten
the team with the hardest goals to accomplish. Along with that, of course,
comes the fact that it normally has the most people. I usually don't play as
the red team; I trust that Ding leads the team correctly every time. Usually
if it dies, it's because of my planning, not a lack of AI on the part of the
computer.
My green team is the hybrid team. Sometimes it has a sniper, sometimes a
demo expert, sometimes it has four people, sometimes three, whatever the
situation calls for. If green team is near red team, chances are that green
is in a support role. It's not unheard of for me to give a hostage to green
for rescue, but I usually reserve that for red.
You may have entirely different ideas on how your colors should be assigned,
and that's fine. The point though, is that if you are consistent with the
way you assign teams and team colors, you're better organized once the fight
commences, and usually the side with better organization is going to come
out on top.
Speaking of organization, let me bring up my gold team again. Never, and I
mean NEVER put a sniper by his lonesome. Even if that sniper is going to sit
in one spot for the whole mission, it's better that the other two teams go
in with six men between them than leave the sniper's back exposed. If you
play as the sniper, you'll see how little of the land you actually get to
see when you're looking through that scope. There's no way you can defend
yourself from a blind spot, so your allies in that team will help you out.
In mission 2, there's one attic where I always send a sniper, and one time I
sent him in alone. A terrorist climbed the ladder, but I didn't hear him,
and he scared me out of my wits when he plugged me in the head. With an
ally, my friend would have blown away the terrorist the moment his shiny
bald head peeked from the edge of the ladder, and I would have been fine.
+-------------------------------------+
|TACTIC 4: THE RIGHT TOOLS FOR THE JOB|
+-------------------------------------+
Just as you wouldn't bring in a sniper if you're fighting indoors, you
shouldn't come with nothing but pistols if you're in open areas. Missions
can be won or lost simply by what you equip your men and women with prior to
engagement.
The first thing you need to decide is how much firepower you want to bring
to the table. If you're against unarmored enemies, then it's not necessary
to bring along assault rifles. Submachine guns with hollow-point rounds are
fantastic in the early missions; it doesn't take too many rounds to floor a
baddie, even with a weak weapon.
If you've got a sniper rifle, you need to consider stability. On mission 3,
my favorite sniping spot is in an attic, shooting almost straight down
through a window. That makes me run into problems, because I have to stand
to get the right angle. As such, I use the PSG-1 because of its stability.
If you're going to be on a flatter area, then you can go with something more
high-powered.
Beyond the weapons themselves, you have to think about the optional parts.
In mission 1, and any other mission where stealth is not important, then you
generally don't need to suppress your weapons. Although enemies will hear
gunshots and come running, I would rather face a couple more enemies with a
higher powered firearm than face only a couple with a weaker version.
Remember, suppressors absolutely kill the damage and range ratings of a
weapon, and that's murder (literally) in open areas. Suppressing assault
rifles especially make them all but worthless.
In hostage situations, though, just the opposite is true. In Raven Shield,
the terrorists sometimes blow away hostages simply because they HEAR you.
Some terrorists will even hear you, run away, tell the hostage keepers
you've arrived, and then the hostage keepers will do the dirty work. You
can't run that risk.
Beyond that, though, you need to know what your teams are doing. If you have
a specific team that rescues the hostages, you can outfit THEM with
suppressors, but let the other two teams go with loud versions. Snipers
especially seem hampered with suppressed sniper rifles, and light machine
guns can't even HAVE suppressors. You can still use unsuppressed weapons in
hostage missions, you just can't use them AROUND the hostages.
+--------------------------------------------+
|TACTIC 5: USING MOVEMENT AND ROE EFFECTIVELY|
+--------------------------------------------+
There are nine possible combinations that dictate how a team acts and
reacts. The three movement rates--blitz, normal, and cautious--can be
combined with any of the three rules of engagement--assault, infiltrate, and
recon.
You need to select the combination based on the teams objective. For the
most part, assault/normal is all you'll need. There's not too many missions
where you shouldn't fire at any enemy you see, and there's usually little
reason to change your movement.
However, when the situation calls for it, don't be afraid to change the way
the team works. If I'm in a big area with little cover, I use
assault/cautious. Cautious tells your people to crouch as they move, making
them smaller targets for enemy snipers. If there is a lot of cover, I use
assault/blitz so they quickly move from obstacle to obstacle, constantly
keeping boxes or planes or whatever between them and the enemy.
There are a couple of situations where recon and infiltrate will be
necessary, but you probably won't want the computer to control those teams
anyway when it happens. To avoid spoiling the plot and missions, I won't go
into the details about that.
+----------------+
|TACTIC 6: ORDERS|
+----------------+
For the most part, your computer-controlled teams will do what they're told.
The problem with that is they won't contest mistakes on your part... that's
part of the game, though.
I breach, bang, flash, gas, and smoke rooms as I need to. However, I always
use those as my last option (with the exception of breaching; I'll explain
why in a moment). Remember, in order for an operative to use a grenade, s/he
has to take the time to: 1) Stop firing, 2) Put away the weapon, 3) Pull out
the grenade, 4) Pull the pin, 5) Throw the grenade, 6) Put away the grenade,
7) Pull the weapon back out, and 8) Aim before s/he is able to attack again.
That's a LOT of time for an operative to be defenseless. Yeah, I know he's
got cover usually, but a terrorist loves aiming at the defenseless guy for
obvious reasons. If you're standing face-to-face with a terrorist, and
you're dumb enough to drop your weapon in favor of pulling a grenade or
something, you might as well paint a big target on your face.
That's why, for the most part, it's better to storm a room with your gun
out. You may not have the shock value a well-placed flashbang would do, but
at least you won't have to worry about being picked off by an enemy while
you're standing there fumbling with the grenade.
Feel free to give the team an order to frag or bang a room or area if you
know they're well covered and have the time. However, don't put too much
stock into it; remember, they're not smart enough to open doors a crack.
Smoking an area is something else, but they won't wait for the smoke to
thicken before running to the next waypoint without a little control on your
part. I explain that in a moment too.
+-----------------------------------+
|TACTIC 7: THERE IS NO "I" IN "TEAM"|
+-----------------------------------+
This isn't Metal Gear Solid. You have a team of elite agents, not just one,
to perform these missions. Coordinating the whole team is one of the biggest
parts of the planning phase, and as I've said before, generally the most
organized team gets the win.
If there's a room to storm, take note of its potential ambush points. There
might be a little homemade barricade of tables and barrels facing one door,
but not the other. However, that other door might be covered by a forklift,
although the guy behind that has his back to the first door. If one team
enters the room from one side, they'll be picked off. But if two teams enter
both doors at the same time, both tangos will be kissing the ground before
they can utter a profane word.
Whether by accident or intentional design (I'm betting on the latter),
terrorists don't know who to pick off first if they're presented with two
targets that are on opposite sides of the room. They take the time to select
one target and aim, and by that time, they're normally dead. Your operatives
are the same way, although you should never end up in a situation where that
happens.
If there is a room with multiple entrances, usually the best way to clear it
is to have two or three teams storm it together. That alone eliminates a lot
of ambush potential because the enemy won't know who to attack first, and
again that split second delay is all you'll need. It also guarantees that no
one else will get the jump on your people from the back or from another door
while the firefight is going on.
In the last section, I mentioned that breaching is the only thing I'll do to
a room if I don't have to. The reason is because a breaching charge will not
only take down anyone standing too close to the door, it will confuse the
heck out of tangos (again, I'm not sure whether that was accidental or
intentional design). In mission 1, my favorite part is when we're on the top
floor, and I breach a room from each of its three doors. The tangos have no
idea who to aim at first, and my guys take out all threats before they can
blink. THAT'S efficiency.
Generally speaking, if a room does have multiple entrance points, there is
no better tactic than to breach all doors and run in, guns blazing. The
tangos won't see it coming, and the element of surprise is what separates
clean kills from all-out firefights.
+-----------------------------------------+
|TACTIC 8: WHAT YOU CAN'T SEE CAN HURT YOU|
+-----------------------------------------+
In a game that touts "one-shot, one-kill lethality," you don't have the time
to run to a spot, crouch twice, pull out your primary gun, get set, zoom in,
turn on the thermal scope, find the target, double-check your aim, and pull
the trigger. By that time, you or a teammate (or both) may be taking dirt
naps.
However, by the same account, the enemies are in the same boat. Even on the
hardest difficulty settings, enemies cannot see through walls and other
objects. They may have no idea that you're crouched behind the corner, just
waiting to see some flesh that you can put a few slabs of lead into. They
don't normally have the luxury of getting set if you're on your game, and
like the old Texas shoot-outs, whoever gets the first shot off normally
wins.
I have several tactics I like using to splatter an enemy's brains all over
the walls before he knew what hit him. With the induction of the fluid open
and close of doors via the mouse wheel, you can be pretty forward without
endangering yourself. In mission one, I suspected an enemy was through a
door (I didn't have a Heartbeat Sensor equipped, so I wasn't sure). The room
was small, but I didn't want to endanger myself by opening the door, so I
equipped my frags and opened it a crack. I heard the terrorist say "Hello?"
and immediately pulled the pin. I threw it in the room, closed the door, and
backed up a step. Two seconds later, that terrorist was shaking Satan's
hand.
You don't have to frag a room to make an entrance though. Banging a room can
be just as effective, especially with the above tactic. Flashbangs don't
affect you or your team one iota if the explosion happened in the next room
and the adjacent door was closed. Once I opened the door a crack, tossed in
a flashbang, slammed the door, then busted in as soon as I heard the
explosion. The terrorist had his back to us, aiming at the window that lead
to a brick wall, and he had no idea what hit him.
That's all well and good for close quarters, but what about long-range
areas? In the opening paragraph to this section, I cited a situation that
you will encounter early on in the campaign. There's two insertion zones in
an early mission, one of which has just one path leading from it, and that
one path is being watched by an enemy sniper. The default plan that ships
with the game has the sniper team bang the area before running there to
snipe. That's all well and good, I suppose, but the problem is that
flashbangs have to be damn close to the target to work. If you're a mile
away, you can stare at the flashbang and not be affected. Instead of
distracting the enemy, all you'll do is attract unwanted attention.
There's a much better solution. A combination of smoke grenades and the
thermal scope of a sniper rifle can do amazing things. Although night-vision
goggles can't see through smoke, thermal goggles CAN because the smoke gives
off no heat. My solution to that sniper dilemma was to smoke the area, then
run in, go prone, and aim my sniper rifle. I zoomed in, turned on the
thermal scope, and viola! That enemy sniper was looking at the smoke, but
didn't know what to make of it. The next thing he knew, he had a bullet in
his eye. Some nearby guards heard the commotion and came to investigate, and
I picked them off too because that smoke cloud had not yet gone away.
Only try this exact tactic if you're going to control the sniper. Auto-aim
does not take into account the thermal scope, only what you can actually see
with your naked eyes. So, even if you have everything working perfectly,
you'll still need to manually target the enemy. The computer is also not
smart enough to use thermal goggles through a smoke screen, although they
USUALLY (note that I did NOT say "always") see a terrorist through the
disappearing smoke before the terrorist see them. I've extensively tested
whether my computer-controlled sniper did as good of a job as I did in this
situation, and I found that only 5 times out of 10 did she manage to kill
the enemy sniper with one round, and only 7 of the 10 times did she kill the
enemy before he took down one of my men. Considering she could have used the
thermal scope like I did, that's hideous.
That doesn't mean that the computer is WORTHLESS using this tactic though.
That ugly percentage is based on only one specific situation in one specific
mission. If you give your CPU-controlled team to smoke an area, then you
have them set up to snipe there, they normally do so with little problem.
They have no concept of time, though, and they'll smoke an area and run to
the spot before the smoke has had a chance to get thick. To fix that, have
them throw the smoke grenade from a distance, then tell them to move
cautiously to the point at which you want them to snipe. That will usually
buy the smoke grenade enough time to fully obscure the team from the prying
eyes of the terrorists, at least until the sniper can set himself.
Speaking of the thermal scope, though, there's another issue with it that
you have to take into account. Windows block heat, no matter how close the
target or the sniper is. If the window is close to you, you may want to
avoid using the thermal scope long enough to make sure there is no tango in
your immediate sights. If you have a chance, blow out the window with a
sniper round or pistol round. That might attract attention, but at least
you're expecting it, and then you can actually use the thermal scope.
Remember, if the smoke grenade is still active, you can blow out a window
without compromising your position. The enemy may understand that there's a
threat, but he won't have any idea where it's coming from.
+--------------------------------------------+
|TACTIC 9: THE WALLS HAVE EYES, NOT JUST EARS|
+--------------------------------------------+
Terrorists in Raven Shield are not the mindless enemies that games once
showed back in the days of Doom and Duke Nuke 'Em. If they hear or see
things happen, they will take action. Keep that in mind when you're planning
a mission.
In mission 5, there's a room with a hostage, and it overlooks a room with a
patrolling tango. In one of my first attempts, I had my team blow that
patrolling guy away in full view of the window. The guards upstairs saw him
fall, so they calmly turned and blew away the hostage. Mission failed.
If your team is near hostages, make sure that not only are they using
silenced weapons, they're also in areas away from windows. Try to get angles
so you can take down enemies without them being seen by their buddies, but
still make sure you CAN take them down. I don't like settling on letting a
tango go in favor of killing him in view of another tango, because that one
you allowed to get away might set up an ambush or get help.
A terrorist's hearing isn't too shabby either. I've seen situations in the
game where the enemy is stupid (to paraphrase and testify to PC Gamer, I
once had a mission where a terrorist thought it would be a good idea to
check out a recent grenade explosion), but for the most part they know what
to do when a situation arises. If they hear gunshots, they'll either come
and help out their buddies, or they'll run and wait for you to be caught
off-guard.
As I said in the equipment tactic, suppression is not always necessary. If
you EXPECT other enemies to come and assist, then you really won't be in too
bad of a situation. Before you pull the trigger, make sure you know all the
ways enemies can attack you, and know what your teammates are doing. If you
have a three- or four-man team, you won't have to worry about your tail, and
possibly not your side. If you're looking at the only way in or out of the
room, feel free to light up anyone you see. Even if the enemy gets help,
you'll be prepared for it.
+--------------------+
|TACTIC 10: COVER ME!|
+--------------------+
When things turn violent, your team focuses on their current task. That
means if they're storming a room, they'll STORM THE ROOM and to hell with
everything else. There have been times were my guys stormed a room and
didn't pay attention to the door they entered from until a terrorist snuck
in from the back and planted a few slugs in Rainbow's plans.
Although your guys normally have one member covering the team's tail,
there's no way he can handle an onslaught of enemies. If there's only one
door into a room, or if it's not prudent or possible to send in more than
one team, that doesn't make the other team worthless.
I'll cite mission 4 as an example again. A hostage is being held in a room
that has two doors, but according to my plan, I don't want to send anyone
through that second door (it would require sending that team into a
dangerous open area, something I'm just not comfortable doing). Because my
guys are using suppressed weapons around the hostage, though, no one will
enter through that door because they won't hear anything. However, a
patrolling tango below might hear what's going on, and he'll come up to
investigate.
In that situation, my hostage rescue team is screwed because they won't be
watching the door they entered from. They'll be too busy clearing the room
and securing the hostage to watch their six, and that spells trouble. To
remedy that, I use a second team to watch the staircase that leads to the
door to that room. That way, if a terrorist things it will be a good idea to
shoot up my main team's back, the cover team will put a quick stop to it.
In other mission, I kept finding that as I led the hostages from their pen
to the extraction zone, enemies would pour through one particular door and
slaughter me to pieces. I pass that door on the way to the pen, but it's
closed and I go unnoticed on my way through. Once I start heading back
though, everyone knows I'm here, and they know how to stop me. My solution
was to get another team to constantly watch that door after I passed it. The
next time I went tried it, they did indeed try to cut me off, but they never
expected that cover man to take them out.
Cover teams are tricky, though. If you implement one, you have to prepare
it. If you think that they'll only have to cover one or two tangos, a sniper
can do the trick. I find it best though to have my cover teams made of one
man who carries a light machine gun. With 100-round magazines, he can last
on his own for quite a long time if the enemies bottleneck at a doorway or
other such obstacle.
Get friendly with the way the snipe order works. If a team gets a snipe
order but has no sniper, it chooses its best sniper of the group, sets his
weapon to single-shot mode if he can, and he concentrates on his sights at
the target. This doesn't have much value with submachine guns, but if you
give a snipe order to a guy with a light machine gun, he'll have the
stopping power to cover an area for a long time. Giving such an order in a
hallway or at a doorway, as I just talked about, is a heck of a combination.
Normally I say that snipers should be two-man teams, but if you've got a
sniper as a cover man ONLY, then he might be able to get away with being
solo. Still, I would prefer giving a solo guy a light machine gun over a
sniper rifle any day.
An extremely effective strategy is to have two teams breach a room while
having a third as a cover. This confuses the enemies in the target room,
making them ripe for shooting, but also removes the possibility of the teams
getting jumped from behind. I find that I get consistent, good results using
cover teams for practically every single room breach. It takes longer, but
my mission success rate has gone up.
+--------------------------------------+
|TACTIC 11: LEARNING FROM YOUR MISTAKES|
+--------------------------------------+
You will lose your first mission. Even if you manage to eliminate every
tango in the first level, you will lose at least one team member. You will
never have a plan that will ALWAYS work. That's the randomness of the game.
The thing to remember is that, until you find a plan that CONSISTENTLY
works, you'll be in a learning stage. I never take mission failures as
defeat, only as lessons. If my red team keeps getting slaughtered in one
building, I'll try to approach it differently. If my gold team can't snipe
from their location, even after setting up the smoke grenade, I'll scrap
that team and try a different waypoint with an assault team. If my green
team can't rescue the hostage because they're taking too long setting up the
breach, I'll go in without any explosives.
Observer mode is fantastic because you can see exactly where missions go to
hell. Once you go back to the planning stage, change the waypoint or RoE or
movement or SOMETHING at that point. Don't neglect what works, however; if
one team is constantly getting its job done, don't mess with it.
Know when problems you encounter are just coincidences. I have a plan on the
first stage that will nine times out of ten work without any member of my
team taking a bullet. However, sometimes as they enter one particular room,
a terrorist who isn't always in an overlooking room will spot them and lob a
grenade that they won't have time to react to.
If you have some sort of bad situation that you've only seen once in that
location, it probably won't happen enough to change the plan. Sometimes you
just need to Retry Action once or twice, and the same plan that's failed
will work smoothly. What you're looking for is consistency, a plan that will
USUALLY succeed with minimal losses. Note that finding that plan may take
hours and hours of work.
And in the end, that's what I love about Rainbow Six. There aren't too many
games where I spend far more time planning than I do actually playing. With
enough practice, and enough tweaking to your own strategies, you'll be
stopping terrorists and bringing honor and pride to Rainbow in no time.
+--------------+
|+------------+|
||CONTRIBUTORS||
|+------------+|
+--------------+
If you wish to contribute a tactic of your own, please e-mail me. I'll post
it with all due credit.
+-----------------+
|+---------------+|
||VERSION HISTORY||
|+---------------+|
+-----------------+
v1 (23 April 2003)
First release, and finished for now, but this guide will never be "done." If
you have something to add, feel free to submit!
+----------------+
|+--------------+|
||COPYRIGHT INFO||
|+--------------+|
+----------------+
An HTML version of this guide can be found at my website, listed near the
bottom of this document.
This document is copyright 2003 for J. "PyroFalkon" Habib. If you plan to
use any of it as part of another FAQ, you need my permission first. However,
if you plan to post it on a website or e-mail it to someone or whatnot, you
may do so without my permission AS LONG AS IT IS NOT ALTERED IN ANY WAY. I'd
like you to drop me an e-mail so I know where you're going to take it, but I
will not require you to do so. You may download it or print it at your
leisure.
The most updated version will always be found at these sites:
http://www.gamefaqs.com/
http://www.geocities.com/pyrofalkon/
Other sites may have up-to-date versions, but check GameFAQs or my website
first.
+--------------+
|+------------+|
||CONTACT INFO||
|+------------+|
+--------------+
If any information is incorrect, or you wish to submit something, please
e-mail me. My address is found on the bottom of the FAQ. Credit will be
given where it's due.
I encourage you to send me some strategies of your own. However, they MUST
BE GENERAL TACTICS. If they can only relate to a couple missions, then I
won't accept it. Understand that just because you send me something, I do
have the right to reject it for whatever reason I choose (although if I do
reject it, I'll send you a reply telling you why).
If you submit something to me, I will credit you by the name you signed in
the message body or by the name attached to your e-mail. I will also post
your e-mail address unless you specifically tell me not to.
If you wish to be e-mailed when this FAQ is updated, send your request to
me. If you have a junk mail protector on your e-mail program, make sure you
put my e-mail address on the safe list, or my messages may not get through.
http://www.geocities.com/pyrofalkon/
pyrofalkon@hotmail.com
Good luck in Rainbow Six 3: Raven Shield, and may all your operatives get
out of their missions without taking one round.