Team Play: Getting Started

Even when playing with a tight group of friends, getting four individuals to play and react together as a team is a challenge. Left 4 Dead takes the team play concept to the next level. Not only is teamwork recommended, it’s absolutely required.

Teams who don’t cooperate or communicate won’t stand a chance. But it’s not as daunting as it sounds. There are a few things you can do to ensure your team play sessions run smoothly and successfully. Here are a few tips to help your team get started.

Establish Communication With Your Team

There’s no time to type messages back and forth, so make sure everyone on your team has a microphone and knows how to use it—gray speaker icons appear next to their names in the lobby if they have microphones connected.

If playing with strangers online, say hi and establish a rapport with your new teammates. Breaking the ice in the lobby will pay off later as the game begins.

Get Organized

Before beginning a game, discuss your individual roles. It’s usually a good idea to elect one teammate as the leader. This player will not only physically lead the team but make key pathfinding decisions at branches, determining which direction the team will go.

Therefore, the leader should have some experience with the layout of the maps you’re about to blitz through. But most importantly, the leader should possess good communication skills, constantly checking in with teammates and ensuring everyone stays together and healthy.

Diversify your Firepower

When choosing weapons at the beginning of a level, mix it up, taking a couple of shotguns and two SMGs or assault rifles. This gives your team a good balance of firepower capable of engaging threats at close and long range. Never take more than one sniper rifle.

Although powerful, sniper rifles have a low rate of fire and take a long time to reload. And since most engagements occur at close to intermediate range, the rifle’s scope isn’t very useful; it can even be a liability.

Stay Together, Stay Alive

It may sound easy, but keeping four players together during a chaotic advance is a constant challenge. But it’s a challenge that must be overcome if you hope to make it to the safe house.

Stay in constant voice communication with your teammates, calling out targets and issuing warnings.

If you need to stop and heal, let everyone know so they don’t leave you behind. When stopping, make sure everyone gets the message. Anyone who continues advancing on their own won’t stand a chance.

Use the Survivors’ Names When Communicating

It’s often easier to say Bill, Francis, Louis, or Zoey in the heat of battle than it is to decipher someone’s 15-character Gamertag. So take note of what survivor you’re playing as and respond to any questions or requests when addressed by this name.

Share the Health Supplies

If your character is healthy and someone else on your team is seriously injured, either heal your teammate with a first aid kit or hand over a bottle of pills.

Injured players slow down the whole team, so it’s in everyone’s best interest to keep everyone healthy and moving at maximum speed.

Each player can carry one first aid kit and one bottle of pills, so there are usually enough supplies to go around if you all share.

Make a Habit of Closing Doors Behind You

The infected can’t open doors. Instead, they must break them down with melee attacks. While a simple wooden door won’t last long when faced with such violent attacks, it will delay the infected, allowing your team to slip away or prepare to engage the attackers.

Often the sound of the infected breaking down a door is just enough to get your team’s attention, preventing you from being attacked from behind.

Use the Vocalization Command to Quickly Relay Information

This is a context-based command that issues canned audio messages to point out threats and supplies to your teammates. Simply aim at an object or threat and press the appropriate button or key to make an announcement.

Keep Tabs on Your Teammates

You can see your teammates at all times, even if they’re not in your current line of sight. They appear as blue glowing silhouettes if blocked by an object such as a wall. If the teammate’s silhouette turns orange, it indicates danger.

This could mean a variety of things. Your partner could be covered in a Boomer’s bile, dangling from a ledge, incapacitated, pinned by a Hunter, or ensnared by a Smoker’s tongue. In any case, get there as quickly as possible to assist.