This is Part two of ZechS' Shootmania: Elite attacking guide. Click Here to go back to part one.

Danger zones

In the instant you try to laser a defender, a sequence of calculations plays out in your brain:

1. I see an enemy
2. Is enemy vulnerable?
3. Yes, the enemy is open to an attack
4. Quickly aim at the enemy, with pinpoint accuracy
5. Fire the shot with precise timing, before the defender moves to safety
6. Dodge his rocket.

Phew!

Sometimes the defenders are being too defensive, and they expose themselves for such a short amount of time that it's simply impossible for your brain to run through these steps quickly enough to get the shot. So what can you do?

Imagine you throw a ball straight up into the air. At it approaches the peak of its height, the ball will slow down. For a fraction of a second, a mid-air ball thrown directly upwards will have zero velocity at the point of turning; it will actually stop moving.

Check out this gif.. notice that the ball is kind of blurry, except for when it reaches the top, and stops for a moment.


The defender who strafes from cover, fires a rocket, and then strafes back into cover goes through exactly the same process as a ball thrown up into the air.

The defender must slow down to a stop before he can accelerate back towards the fence. The exact location where the defender loses all velocity is what I'm calling a danger zone. It's usually <=1m from the edge of the fence, and this is your chance to take them out!

Learn these danger zones, and keep your crosshair locked onto these locations as you move.

Pre-fire with the laser!

If you see a regular movement pattern from a defender behind a fence, and you're pretty sure he's about to pop out; don't hesitate to fry him!

You can fire your laser at the 1m danger zone when you feel the time is right. It's like a gut feeling, almost a pre-fire with the laser.

This works best when you combine it with rotating the defenders, mentioned in part 1 of this attacking guide. If a defender is behind a fence, you can charge to the side and open up a shot. This isn't too risky, because you are controlling the situation.

You can know the defender location through sound, or by extrapolating from his last movement before he disappeared behind a wall. If you realize that you can predict exactly where he is , then it's okay to charge and pre-fire with the laser.

Even if rotating would be dangerous; you can sprint up, fire around the corner, and then immediately retreat.

This kind of shot is often too fast for you to aim properly – but hopefully it's too fast for the opponent to dodge too. If you miss the shot, it shouldn't be a problem because you're already sprinting backwards to safety.

If you try this at close range, you're likely to take a rocket to the face – but sometimes you need to break an egg in order to make a pancake! Having said that, it's much safer to do it from long range, if possible.

By doing this, you're infinitely more likely to hit a defender than if you didn't shoot at all. If he manages to avoid your shot, just choose a different target and try again as soon as your laser reloads. Keep moving, keep switching targets, and keep firing these preemptive lasers.

These kind of shots are often done by high level players. You might see a pro player shooting a defender the very instant he pops out from a corner, and be amazed at his reflexes and accuracy. In reality, he has probably practiced that shot a hundred times, and got lucky the defender was exposed this round.

Don't sit still, aiming and waiting for the defender to move. You need to be aggressive, and force them instead.

I want to stress that you should try to be smart about the shots you take. I am NOT suggesting that you fire recklessly, with no patience at all. You can pre-fire with the laser when you have a gut feeling the defender will move, but mostly you should keep your crosshair over the area, ready to strike as soon as they slip up!

Again, don't sit still and hope they'll move. This wastes too much time, and the defender will simply wait you out. You need to be moving around, pressuring and tempting the defenders to make a mistake.

It's important that you don't fire the shot if missing will leave you in trouble. When you miss, you have to wait for 2 seconds before you can protect yourself – so being patient and forcing a defender mistake is the best approach.

Open play

Now that we have an idea of how to handle both a rush defence and a cover defence, it's time to work on our open play - when defenders are neither rushing you or setting up camp behind a fence.

If you have multiple defenders to choose from, how do you decide which one you should take out?
This situation can happen quite often during the last few seconds before the pole becomes live and ready for capture.

Here are some example scenarios:

Scenario 1.

There are 3 defenders alive, and the pole is 10m front of you.
One of the defenders is 5m behind the pole, one of them is a 10m to the left of the pole, and one of them is 10m behind you. You only have time for one shot, before trying for a capture. Who do you shoot?

Answer: It's not an easy call, but your best chance is with the defender to the left.

Why?: If there's a defender behind you, it means you have managed to get past him. Obvious, right?

So what does this mean? Well, if you got past him, he probably fired some rockets when he tried to stop you. So although the defender to the left is the same distance away from you as the defender behind, he probably has more rockets ready in his barrel, so he is probably the greater threat.

The defender behind the pole doesn't have a direct line of sight, so the pole acts gives you a little cover; reducing the immediate danger from this player.

So the main point here is: decide which defender is your biggest threat. He is almost always your primary target.

Sometimes a distant defender might make a mistake and will be more vulnerable to your shot than a nearby defender who is applying a lot of pressure on you.

In this situation, you need to assess if you'll be able to survive the dangerous defender for the next 2 seconds after you fire your laser. Even if you get the kill on the distant defender, it isn't worth it if you eat 3 rockets from his close-range ally.

Also it's good to pay attention to the name-tags of the defenders. If you know one of them is much more skilled than the other two, then your focus should be on him. It's a good idea to take out his weaker allies first if he isn't in a position to punish you for it, but make sure you're aware of him at all times.

Scenario 2.

There are 2 defenders 10m in front of you. They're applying equal pressure, but you can't back away; you must push forwards. One of the defenders is on the ground, and one of them has just jumped into the air. Who should you target?

Answer: Aim for the defender in the air.

Why?: Flying defenders can't change direction.

This might be really obvious to you, but it needs to be mentioned just in case.
The defender on the ground can change direction quite freely. The defender in the air cannot. Save for a little air-control, he is pretty much unable to control his trajectory for the next ~1 second. His movements are easier to predict, so he's the safer option of the two.

When there are two targets of equal threat, you must target the one who you are more likely to hit. After all, you would probably lose the round if you missed a shot in this situation.

Scenario 3.

There are 2 defenders in a fairly straight line ahead of you, both popping from cover to fire rockets. One of them is 20m away, and the other is 40m away. Who do you target?

Answer: Aim for the 40m defender.

Why?: The 40m defender is probably more vulnerable.

The 40m defender feels safe because of the 20m defender in front of him. In his mind, his 20m team-mate is in more danger than him. It makes sense; after all, he's closer to you and should be easier to shoot.

Mr 20m is the obvious target. Because Mr 40m knows this, he's more likely to take risks than his 20m companion.

You can often hit some great shots on more vulnerable, more distant opponents. Keep an eye out, and try to catch them with their pants down.

The other reason is because the further defender is a smaller target. If you were to aim for the 20m defender, and you missed your shot, you are very unlikely to hit the 40m defender because he is so small on the screen. By comparison, if you miss a shot on the 40m defender, you have greater chances of accidentally hitting the 20m one.

Maximise your chances of hitting

If you break through the outer defenders, and you know they have to chase you to the pole, make sure you maximise your chance to hit.

Don't wait somewhere off to the side of their movement path. Instead, wait at a distance directly in front of them. If you hide to the side, they're only vulnerable to your shot for a limited time until they pass. Waiting near their destination (usually the pole) ensures they'll be on your screen for the maximum amount of time possible as they approach you.

In some situations, the only way for them to get any closer to the pole is to become vulnerable to a laser shot. If you hold your shot, the defender knows you can hit them at any time. This means they will often hide in cover for the longest time possible. Not shooting your laser puts huge amounts of pressure on the defender, and you're likely to force a mistake from less experienced players.

Eventually they will have to try and shoot you off the pole. The better players will move with some trickery, so expect them to shoot rockets at point-blank walls to bounce themselves in an unpredictable direction.

If you miss your shot when they do this, they're in a good position to rush you down and take you off the pole. Instead, try to wait a little longer for the shot.

Once they've bounced, they usually end somewhere in the open, and will be unable to move very fast in any direction. They might even jump because of the pressure from you! This is when you should fire your laser; when they're most vulnerable. Just take your time, and only fire when you know it'll hit for sure!

Coming soon: Check out part three for information on how to play the pole. To capture or not to capture?

Hello everyone,

Just wanted to announce that I have reached a total of 1058.67 hours in Shootmania. I have been playing the game since June last year (closed beta) and with a 1.5 month break with no internet in August/September.

"I have never had so much fun playing any other game than ShootMania, it's given me the chance to make new real friends, an excuse to participate in LAN tournaments/win money & to gain experience in the eSports community/industry!"

So how much have you clocked in on this game? Find out by accessing each individual Title in your ManiaPlanet > Title(i.e. storm) > Profile > Statistics and count your Playtime and editing time (if you've done map building) and share your results in the comments of this news post!

Wabbitface's SM Playtime

Elite: 498.44
Storm: 352.44
Map Editor: 120.46 - added all individual title times (storm/elite being most common)
Joust: 30.28
Combo: 17.58
Royal (exp). 18.08
Royal: 15.29
Heroes: 4.10

Total: 1058.67 Hours!

My name is p.iBlack

With the latest Shootmania update we have been given the possibility to give/receive ManiaStars but it looks like most players don't know how to get them or even what they mean.
Every day I receive questions like: " What do these Stars mean? " or " How can I get a Star? Looks cool! "


Right now I'm going to explain to you a few things about ManiaStars:
1) What is a ManiaStar.
2) History of ManiaStars.
3) How to get a ManiaStar.

What is a ManiaStar?

Official answer:
ManiaStars allow you to vote for up to five players you appreciate.
Each day all current votes are recorded and from 0 to 5 stars are awarded based on the number of votes.

My answer:
ManiaStars are a nice feature, which allows you to vote for your friends(or enemies) and give them a chance to have their name looks cooler! (When a new player asks you what is this star you can answer him:" I'm one of the best players, that's how I got it) I always do like that...
When you have voted for your friend, he receives StarDays.

For example:
1 friend voted for me today and I have 1 StarDay.
Tomorrow I'll have 2 StarDays and etc.
40 friends voted for me today=80 StarDays tomorrow

It is still unknown how many StarDays are needed to get 3,4,5 stars but I think that right now the system works like that(this is not official info, not yet updated by nadeo):

History of ManiaStars.

Prepare to travel back a long long time ago...

Year 2006:
Nadeo announced "TrackMania Nations ESWC" game.
Along with in game profiles players got ability to view their player profiles in a web.
After the player had connected to the playerpage they were able to check how many players are online, view their buddy list,ranking or even officially join team to compete with other teams and then become a top team in TMN ESWC.
There was one specific feature which was very popular and is relevant to this post.

It was called Hall Of Fame:

Every player was able to vote for an infinite number of friends or people who were exchanging their votes(I vote for you, you vote for me)
A few months later every popular player had 5 Stars next to their name and stars were shown in player statistics on a server:


After some time these stars started to disappear. Players who had 4 stars on one day may only have 3 stars a month later and only a few people knew why this occurred:
StarDays were growing dynamically.

Example of the old system:
1st of April a player must have 50 StarDays to get 1 Star.
1st of August player must have 120 Stardays to get 1 Star.
I do not remember the actual speed at which the requirments were growing, but I liked the idea of increasing StarDays every real day.

How to get a ManiaStar.

As I've previously said, thanks to the new update these stars are back!
Now every ShootMania player can have them and vote for friends or clan members.
I hope you are ready, my young padawan?

Nice, its time to show you the force of playerpage!
Step 1:
Click on this link:https://player.maniaplanet.com/
Now login with your in game login and password.


Step 2:
Welcome to playerpage mainmenu. You have a lot of things to explore for yourself but please, come with me!
Click "Community" and "ManiaStars" from the drop-down menu.


Step 3:
You are almost done!
Here you can see the players you have already voted for and here you can give a vote.


Soon you will be able to check how many StarDays you have. This is still a new thing in ManiaPlanet so please, be patient.

Step 4:
After a few seconds of choosing who you want to vote for, type his/her login in the box and vote.

I liked something here:
It shows you ingame nickname of the player you want to vote for, so you can't vote for another person with a similar login.

Bad thing:
You can only vote for 5 people from your account.



Thats it! Now you know how to get a nice star near your name and look cooler, but never forget that skill is key in this game. Your rank or number of stars will never help you to win cups and tournaments.

May the force be with you!

© 2013 Paragon-eSports.com

Hello everyone, tomorrow you will all be able to choose seats for I49, If you havent booked your ticket, its still available for 20% discount.

Visit this page for more info http://us1.campaign-ar...d=548b1f83c2&e=eed57d6b7b


For our forum post please visit here.

This is the first of ZechS' three-part guide to attacking like a boss on Shootmania:Elite.

A Defender's game

Elite is a defender's game. Statistically, successful defence rounds are more common than successful attacks. This can create a lot of pressure for an attacker, and in a competitive environment, the dreams of a whole team can be made or broken by what one player does over the next 60 seconds.

Of course, you should always keep calm and try to ignore the pressure if you find yourself in that situation. It's a team game, and the entire team must pull their weight; not reply on one star attacker. If your team is knocked out of a tournament because you failed an attack round, keep in mind that the burden doesn't only fall to you. Your team as a whole was responsible for the difficult situation you were in.

Such is the nature of eSports; the knife edge between elation and despair is a thin one indeed. If you had won that attack round, your team could have become champions - so it's time to stand up and rise to the challenge. As they say: "Go big, or go home". A perfect game would have a scoreboard at 9-0, with individual attack scores of 2-2-1 for each team member, and 4 defensive rockets each(and zero points of any kind for the enemy!).

So what should you do if your team-mates can win the attacks, and you're the one who struggles to put points on the board? If you're a new player but you're really serious about getting better, I guarantee that if you do the following, results will come - in time, and with practice.

Before the match

First of all, don't feel guilty if you struggle to win attack rounds. Attacking is super difficult in Shootmania, and if your team are worthy of your respect, they'll give you time to work on it.

Make sure your game and mouse settings are configured properly. The only suggestion I can offer is that the best players generally have their mice set to very low sensitivity, and play with the graphics turned down for smoother performance. Check out this reddit post about pro player configurations for some inspiration, but ultimately your optimum game and mouse customization will be unique to you.

That doesn't mean you shouldn't be open to trying new things. A different setting, whilst uncomfortable first, might grow to suit your style of play - so be open to suggestions from others, making sure to give them a fair trial.

Try to spend 20 minutes per day in a Storm instagib FFA server. Look for a server which has similar settings to Elite; the same laser reload time, and the same maps if possible. If you're an EU player, the Useful Instagib server has these settings.
Playing instagib gives you more practice with the laser than playing Elite does. Whilst playing Elite, you only get to hold the laser 1/6th of the time, so although instagib practice shouldn't replace Elite practice, I highly recommend making it part of your regular training. It's probably the quickest way to improve your raw aiming skill.

F6, GLHF

When your attack round starts, try to form a basic strategy. It doesn't have to be too involved, but It helps to have an idea of how you want to approach, and ensures you don't waste time. Perhaps you noticed a vulnerable enemy defender who goes to the same position every time, or maybe you're hoping to sneak around and dive the pole at the last second.

Having a goal also means you must have an approximate idea of how much time it'll take. Climbing the sides of a map might give you a good vantage point, but it might also take so much time that you can't get to the pole quick enough. Just keep watching the clock, and keep an ear out for sound which tells you that the pole has become capturable.

Always have a plan B

Whatever you decide to do, make sure you leave an escape route ready, just in case it doesn't work out.

For example, pretend you want to take out a defender who's hiding inside a cage. You might be tempted to rush into the cage and light him up with your laser. That sounds like as good a plan as any - but what if you miss your shot, and another defender attacks you from behind, closing off your exit? Your chances of surviving 10 point-blank rockets when you can't dodge or return fire are slim at best!

Instead, consider shooting into the cage as you sprint past it. If you hit the defender, great! But if you don't? No problem; you can continue forwards and make your way to your next target. The key is to always keep your options open, else it's all too easy to miss that shot and find yourself up the creek without a laser. The first defender is the most important one to take down, so shooting him is a good plan to start with. Reducing the number of rockets coming your way by 33% does wonders for your chances!

How to survive a rush defence

For a new player, the most painful thing to deal with on your attack round is a rush defence. We all know the feeling: you've formed your plan, you've left your spawn, you've rounded the first corner – and three defenders are in your face, ready to light you up with 15 rockets from close range. This makes every new player panic, but you must try to keep calm!


Once you've changed your underwear and grasped the situation, it's actually not the most difficult of thing to handle.

If you play Starcraft, it's almost akin to the Photon Cannon rush which plagues the bronze league, and depending on how tough the defenders are, it can be just about as easy to handle if you keep these three steps in mind:

1. Create distance between you and the defenders. You need to retreat away from them- but you should try to face the defenders at all times, or you won't be able to dodge the rockets they hurl your way. This means running backwards, so it's important to learn the map so you can move without colliding with walls and losing momentum.

2. DON'T JUMP. Strong defenders might know where you'll land before you do, and can time their shots to take you out in one volley. I know you want to sprint, and that you must first jump in order to do this - but hold off until it's safe.

3. DON'T SHOOT unless you're 100% sure you're going to hit. As long as you don't shoot your laser, every defender is terrified of you. If they know they might get taken out any second, a good player will have to break off their rush and get to cover before they get turned to ash. If you fire your laser too early and miss, this fear vanishes. The second you fire a laser, the defenders know they have 2 free seconds where you're unable to threaten them in any way.

If the map allows it, retreat backwards, holding your shot, until you can get behind a wall. Once safe, jump and begin your sprint in a path around the defenders. Most of the maps are designed well enough so that there are multiple paths you can take, so hopefully you can just run past the defenders.

With luck, you are now safely ahead of them, and winning a footrace towards the pole – exactly what you want! A chasing defender is a vulnerable defender, so it's actually much easier to take them out if they're chasing your tail; so long as there's some distance between you.

It actually makes a lot of sense when you stop to think about it. If the defender needs to get back to the pole really quickly, they won't have time to take appropriate cover. Depending on your position, you can even sit and wait for them to expose themselves, if you're certain which way they're coming.

A game of averages

Keep in mind that you have 60 seconds to win the round, and you can't capture the pole for the first 45. To increase your chances of success, fire as many shots as possible during these 45 seconds, so long as it's safe to do so. It's a game of averages; if 20% of your shots hit, then firing 20 shots during the round should mean you take out all 3 defenders. Obviously it's not quite that simple, but the basic premise holds true.

A common mistake is to sit still in one area, waiting for the defenders will make a mistake, and without firing your laser. The defenders have no reason to move if they can see you aren't applying any pressure. On the contrary; they're happy to wait out the clock. As an attacker, time is NOT on your side - so make every second count.

I'm guilty of wasting time in Ironfist; shooting my laser up the middle in hopes of picking off a defender, when the chance of hitting is actually very low if they're half decent players. Every second the clock runs down, the defenders get closer to winning. With this in mind, you should continually rotate around the map, keeping the defenders moving, whilst firing shots at the first sight of weakness.

So just to be clear - I'm NOT telling you to spam your laser every few seconds in hopes of a lucky hit. You should be patient and wait for your shot, but move the defenders as much as you can in order make shots available as often as possible.

If a defender is safe behind a wall from one angle, then flanking and attacking from 90 degrees should leave you with an open shot. Even if they know you're rotating, it forces them to move too. They're no longer in the impenetrable position they liked, so this is your chance to make something happen.


Don't worry if your shots miss! Just pick another target, and keep moving.

Keep moving, and keep shooting; trying to catch defenders out as you work your way closer to the pole for the first 55 seconds. Keep it up and you WILL land the shots! It might not happen instantly, but results will come if you're patient enough to work at it.

In such a fast paced game, patience goes a surprisingly long way. Losing it is often the quickest path to defeat!

Click here to check out part two, where you can learn more ways to take out the pesky cage defenders, and find out how to make those amazing reflex shots you've seen in frag videos!