SWAT 4

[Spike88]

Anyone play it? I love it for the atmosphere but its stupidly hard. I have to restart most of the missions either due to me, or my team members dying.

I either end up shooting perps when I don't need to or dying because I didn't shoot them. I ran into one guy who I told to drop the gun, he raised his hand and was bending down to put it down, and then out of nowhere he shoots me in the face.

[Dowly]

It's actually very easy if you take the dirty way. Just sling gas or flashbangs to every room and ask them politely to drop their guns or else. Ow and the AI is piss stupid, they only shoot when they are shot at, so just do the missions yourself or find ppl to play coop with you.

[Spike88]

I noticed shooting anything that moves with the beanbag shotgun also works, but it just doesn't feel right. lol

[NeonSamurai]

One of my favorites, coop is a lot of fun too. I use to play with a modded version of SSF (Sheriffs Special Forces) which improved a lot of things.

Personally I think its a lot more fun to play the game and act as if you are a real swat operator, such as using restraint when using LTLs, and only shooting when you are permitted to under the general ROE SWAT uses.

I don't know what AI you were playing with Dowly but on my system the enemy AI is nasty effective. My officer AI though is kind of dumb as far as positioning and timing (SWAT 3 did it better). The only thing they are good for is shooting back as they have inhuman reflexes. Modded the enemy AI will take and shoot hostages if you get to close, often refuse to surrender until you forcibly cuff them, circle round and attack from behind, use cover and teammates, fake surrender then suddenly draw and open fire, unsurrender and pickup weapons and shoot back if you turn your back on them, etc.

Gas is often unreliable as most of them carry gas masks in the later missions, and flash bangs don't have much of a range and the effect can be blocked if bounced wrong, so don't depend on them with your 'life'. LTLs also become near useless later on as suspects frequently use gas masks, helmets, and body armor which renders everything other then the taser and flashbang useless.

My advice is to take it slow when possible, always mirror, always cover your back, breach and bang when suspects are present in a room. Always pay close attention to the floor plan, plan your entry carefully, and pick your equipment based on the suspect intel you have. Wedges can also be very useful especialy if modded to let you carry extra ones (4 slots is a joke and wedges can be reused IRL)

Oh and the snipers are realy a cheat since they don't follow the ROE and don't penalize you for shooting a non threatening armed suspect.

[Arclight]

Take it room by room and corner by corner, check all for threats (optiwand). Always prep entry if targets present (breach/bang/CS). LTL shotgun is awesome, always works. shoot first, tell 'm to drop it, if non compliant shoot again. If they don't give up after 2nd or 3rd blast, hit 'm with the taser. If entry to a room is possible from 2 different sides, either coordinate entry on both and/or wedge any door you're not coming through. Some might flee and hole up somewhere else; once you go in, the situation should be fully resolved, any runners are gonna be a pain later.

Great game, expansion is good too, too short though.
(thanks to HunterICX for the tip )

Originally Posted by Spike88

I noticed shooting anything that moves with the beanbag shotgun also works, but it just doesn't feel right. lol

I do, feels very right.

Hesitate 1 second and you get shot yourself. I've shot a lot of civies with that thing, and all of them complied.

[Dowly]

Originally Posted by NeonSamurai

I don't know what AI you were playing with Dowly but on my system the enemy AI is nasty effective. My officer AI though is kind of dumb as far as positioning and timing (SWAT 3 did it better).

Ah, sorry. I meant the SWAT AI, they were pretty dumb.

But I gotta say, Swat 3 was IMHO alot better as a whole than what Swat 4 was.

[porphy]

I liked both Swat 3 and 4. Especially with the mod that made your team to dark suit & sunglasses FBI men. My problem was that I always ended up using Rogue Spear tactics. That is total and quick terminal takedown of the bad guys. My scores in Swat were horrible...

cheers poprhy

[Radioshow]

There are alot of servers for multiplay still. My clan has a couple servers, US and EU. I never really played the single player part of it only multi.
Come join ATS Warzone USA for some good teamplay. We also have a ventrillo server for comms.

|ATS|Radioshow, Lt.Gen Swat Division
www.ats-warzone.com

[Captain Vlad]

I loved that game. Tactically, it seemed so differently than RS stuff, simply because of the 'take them alive if you can' dynamic. Enjoyed it greatly and some of the missions (the cult apartments, notably) were very, very atmospheric.

I agree that sometimes your boys could be a bit dense, especially compared to the enemy, but on the other hand, it was a real joy pulling off a simultaneous room entry preceded by gas and stingers.

To compensate for the armor and gas masks later in the game, if you could swing getting both halves of your team to enter a room at the same time, combined with multiple types of grenades and maybe even a breaching charge...well that sort of had all the bases covered.

[Spike88]

Originally Posted by Captain Vlad

I loved that game. Tactically, it seemed so differently than RS stuff, simply because of the 'take them alive if you can' dynamic. Enjoyed it greatly and some of the missions (the cult apartments, notably) were very, very atmospheric.

I agree that sometimes your boys could be a bit dense, especially compared to the enemy, but on the other hand, it was a real joy pulling off a simultaneous room entry preceded by gas and stingers.

To compensate for the armor and gas masks later in the game, if you could swing getting both halves of your team to enter a room at the same time, combined with multiple types of grenades and maybe even a breaching charge...well that sort of had all the bases covered.

I need to get used to multiple team entries then, I kinda go in with one team and have the other watch another door.

The atmopshere is nice, I love the mission where you have to arrest the serial killer who lives with his mother.

But yeah I hate when a badguy comes out of a door that my units are stacked up against and is able to take out 1-2 of them before the others retaliate.

[HunterICX]

Originally Posted by Arclight

Great game, expansion is good too, too short though.
(thanks to HunterICX for the tip )

Glad you've liked it

When I got the game (borrowed from a friend)
I first played the campaign...some missions where a pain to complete thought because coordinating with the AI friends is a pain in the butt.

but online Co-op was awesome, especially when you where with a bunch that went for good teamplay and high scores.

HunterICX

[Nexus7]

Played several mission in CO-OP with 3-4 humans usually. We had voice communications over the headset.
The AI can be nasty and you need to coordinate well with the other team members.

Maybe the hardest missions were the "resque hostage" ones, where if you are detected the terrorist might kill the hostage (lol)

[HunterICX]

Originally Posted by Nexus7

Played several mission in CO-OP with 3-4 humans usually. We had voice communications over the headset.
The AI can be nasty and you need to coordinate well with the other team members.

Maybe the hardest missions were the "resque hostage" ones, where if you are detected the terrorist might kill the hostage (lol)

Voicecom in the game was essential, and the best part about the game was Coordinate and execute the planned storm into the room part.

HunterICX

[Dowly]

Originally Posted by porphy

I liked both Swat 3 and 4. Especially with the mod that made your team to dark suit & sunglasses FBI men. My problem was that I always ended up using Rogue Spear tactics. That is total and quick terminal takedown of the bad guys. My scores in Swat were horrible...

cheers poprhy

You think that's bad? When I found one awesome blood mod for Swat 3, I just went around the LA convention center killing the baddies and then going around and executing the hostages one by one to see the awesome bloodsplatter on the walls.

[NeonSamurai]

The teammate AI isn't too bad as long as you use their strengths (quick reflexes and superb aim) and cover for their weaknesses (mostly brain dead).

Using red and blue independently is key. Myself I never have the full team stack up on a door unless its a very big room. I usually only have red or blue stack and, the other team covers their backs by providing cover down the hall, and I cover the other direction, or the stacked team. I also personally do all mirroring using the optiwand beforehand, and I wedge key doors when ever possible.

I also if facing a lot of baddies will do the breach and bang myself and have them charge in behind as I can time it better and put bangs where I need them.

I also personally tend to mostly pack bangs and only a few cs cans. I never use stingers after having the AI fumble the stupid things and not putting it in far enough. As for LTLs I always preferred the pepper ball gun for anyone not wearing a gas mask. Its great for compliance problems and has a high rate of fire.


As a side topic, what mods if any do you guys use? As I said I use a custom version of SSF with my own weapon tweaks. I hate the stock weapons settings, particularly reticule behavior and the magic spreading shotgun pattern due to reticule spread (I damn well near mod every game with guns to fix these sorts of problems as most devs don't have a clue how to make weapons perform realistically).