Standby for Titanfall – 10 Beginner’s Tips

With the launch of Titanfall less than 24 hours away, the anticipation for this year’s hottest shooter is at a boiling point. Although a lot of players participated in the now closed beta, many will experience the game for the first time. If you never had the chance the play or need to brush up on your skills, check out our 10 beginner’s tips to help kick things off right, then take your experience to the next level with Prima’s Collector’s Edition Titanfall guide.

Note: We compiled these tips from the Titanfall beta. We’ll have in-depth tips when the game releases.

Kill Lots of Grunts

Grunts are computer-controlled bots, serving as an easy way for you to score points and cut down the build time of your Titan. Although you’ll find them all over the place, they aren’t terribly dangerous. Rather than make them your primary focus, kill Grunts when the opportunity presents itself. If you see a large group of them standing around, put a grenade in the middle of the pile and move on. Be careful, if there are a lot of Grunts nearby, there’s likely to be a Pilot not too far away. 

Learn to Double Jump

The double jump is one of the fundamental aspects of moving around in Titanfall. In fact, just running on the ground is a great way to get killed. This maneuver will help you solve many of the game’s problems. Use the double jump to hop from one rooftop to another, dig out the pesky camper in the second story window or even avoid getting crushed by the massive foot of a rampaging Titan. In order to pull this move off, perform a jump as you normally would, and when you hit maximum height, jump again to complete the double jump.

Equip a Suppressor

There’s no bigger advantage in battle than knowing the location of your enemy while remaining unseen yourself. Titanfall is no different. Whether you’re taking down a pack of Grunts or cloaking on a rooftop, staying off the mini-map is essential. Pilots — that’s you — show up on the radar as large red circles that are extremely hard to miss. Trust us, you’ll have enough problems trying to stay alive in Titanfall. There’s no need to make things harder than they already are.

Utilize Burn Cards

You can find Burn Cards in the main menu, or the lobby menu between matches. These cards act as the game’s perk system with a bit of a twist. Burn Cards grant you different benefits, the catch being these benefits only last for one life. Although there were concerns Burn Cards might be too powerful, anyone is capable of using them and only three can be brought into each game. Try to plan out which cards you intend to use throughout the match, thinking several moves ahead as you might in a game of chess. One of our favorite moves involves having our entire team equip the Pull Rank card, reducing the build time of your Titan by 80 seconds. This allows every member of your team to call in their Titan much sooner than the opposition. A final Burn Card tip to get you started: throw away cards you don’t plan to use, since you can only have 26 at a time.

Get to High Ground

There are many ways to get your Pilot to high-ground in Titanfall. You can wall run, double jump or even eject from your doomed Titan. No matter how you do it, utilize the high ground whenever possible. Not only is it one of the only places you can escape the wrath — and foot — of a Titan, it’s a great way to turn the tide and go for the Rodeo Kill. Just be sure to keep an eye out for like minded opposition, rooftops are a very popular place to hangout.

The Titan Dash

As big, powerful and mean as Titans are, they’re also vulnerable to taking damage. Aside from the Titan’s natural shield, players can also utilize the Vortex Shield to keep themselves protected during an attack. Once those options are exhausted, the Titan dash is a life saver. Use this maneuver to quickly get behind cover, allowing your shields to recharge before you continue the fight. It’s also an effective way to close the distance on a doomed Titan, finishing them off with an epic melee attack.

Camping Doesn’t Work

Respawn isn’t the first developer who claimed to cure the FPS world of camping. They are likely the first to have actually pulled it off, though. Sure, camping is possible in Titanfall. The problem — for the camper — is that vertical play makes it nearly impossible to be effective. Go ahead, plop down in the corner on the third floor of that building. Good luck trying to figure out if the threat will be coming from the stairs, windows or gigantic holes in the roof. Besides, not only is camping ineffective, who can resist the urge to wall run and double jump all over the map?

Learn to Wall Run

Here’s another essential aspect to movement in Titanfall. It’s also something else you’ll go over in the tutorial before you start playing. Still, practice makes perfect and becoming proficient at wall running is no easy task. In order to wall run, simply run and jump on a wall from an angle. Your Pilot will begin to run along the wall, slowly losing momentum — sliding down the wall — as you go. Try moving from a wall run to a double jump, maximizing the distance and height you travel. Wall running can also be combined with wall hanging to add an aspect of stealth to your game. If you want to learn more about that you’ll have to check out our advanced tips later in the week.

Cloaking Works

Although cloaking doesn’t make you completely invisible, it comes pretty close. You can be spotted if someone looks closely or if you move around a lot. Still, the benefit of cloaking is to hide you from scanning eyes. In Titanfall, the action is so fast paced that cloaking might just be the advantage you need to sneak into that Hardpoint, or get close to the Titan for the Rodeo Kill. One of our favorite moves is to cloak near the start of a round, as we approach the center of the action. The minor decision often gives you that split second advantage over your opponents. Just be careful not to cloak if you don’t need to. There is a recharge time before you can use it again.

Nuclear Ejection

Although this tip falls under the effective category, it’s also just a lot of fun. Equip this in your Titan kit to cause it to explode when destroyed, taking out anything and everything within close range. In fact, to take things one step further, if you’re Titan is doomed, charge recklessly towards the opposition. Do your best to pin an enemy Titan — or six — into a corner where your Nuclear Ejection will deliver the most devastation possible. Even if you don’t take out any Titans, the explosion will also kill any Pilots or Grunts in the area as well.

Depending on your level of experience with the game, some of the above tips might be fairly obvious. In the end, that’s the point. Sometimes the road to success is more straightforward than we expect. Doing the small, simple things well is often what separates the good players from the great.

Of course, we’d love to hear from you. What tips would you give to someone just starting out in Titanfall? Let us know in the comments.