Camping in a FPS game is a skill. Some people call it cheating, some people call it l4m3. But it's a freaking skill.

If you are complaining about somebody camping in a game it's because you are getting spanked like a 3 year old misfit by the camper.

In a FPS, most people just run around and shoot whatever moves, but the campers are the ones who like to think things through. They are playing for the tactics. Sure racking up the frags is pretty fun, but you can have more fun when you play for tactics.

Instead of rushing around, a camper full utilizes the current map's features by finding spots to scout from. Weather it be croutched in a corner or sitting on a high rock.

Snipers use camping as their main tactic. You can't go running around and using a sniper rifle close up, because most sniper rifles are only one shot and take more time to reload. You are trying to get as close to the enemy without being seen. And this can only be accomplished with camping.

Camping isn't just for Snipers, but also if you have a weapon that isn't that good for close combat or you are low on ammo, you can't just go running straight up to your enemy. You have to find a spot to camp at and pounce your enemy when they get close by.

Sure a lot of newbies like to camp, but they are just getting used to the combat. Most won't realize that the skill they are learning can be improved on in the future.

So to all you people who hate people that like to camp, quit your bitching. Maybe you should start camping and see how it can improve your game.

Quake: Terminology

Camping is a strategy in Quake, and other first person shooter games, that in its vaguest sense, involves lingering around a certain area in a map to gain some sort of tactical advantage. The origins come from the idea that when you linger in a certain area, you make it a camp site. You are thus a camper, and you camp. "Did you pack your tent you fucking camper?!"

There is a wide variety of methods and types of camping, according to factors such as items, weapons, covertness, as well as map and game type. Historically camping has gained a massive degree of notoriety and remains highly unpopular in deathmatch. So much so that often other players will become lumberjacks.

The most effective way of describing camping is through relational definition - Camping:FPS::Rushing:RTS

The definition of camping varies very widely. Some things can be considered camping, other's aren't. Generally camping is:

  • Sitting in one place in order to gain frags.
  • Running a pattern in a very small area in order to horde weapons and/or power-ups.
  • Using a grappling hook (or other method) of getting onto the roof of a level and then sniping.
  • Hanging out by a respawn area waiting for the helpless to arrive - see spawn rape.
    Quake Weenie Tactics Site - www.weenie.com/quake - Accessed 18th August / Clan Monkey
  • Many people feel that camping, by definition, goes against the basic philosophy of deathmatch, which usually frowns upon if not openly discourages, the idea of playing with a fixed strategy in mind. Instead of being lucky and picking up the quad damage as you pass by, you could instead run a tight area around it, or just hang around the quad area. If executed properly one can effectively have quad damage for half the game, which is a devestating advantage. This type of play is generally considered extremely cheap.

    Camping for spawn rapes, the other main form of camping, is similarly considered cheap.

    On the other hand, in games of teamplay and duel, which involves the heavy use of strategy, it is considered acceptable to camp to win. On the sub-professional teamplay level, it is expected (see also lockdown). In duel its ineffectiveness deters players - for the most part.

    Outside of teamplay, camping is usually an ineffectual tactic if you play to win. Despite this, its notoriety has made it a constant witch cry against both people who play fairly, and those who employ similarly unpopular tactics.

    Quake is about the thrill of the hunt, not the nervous wait for the kill.
    -- Gung of Clan Monkey
    Part of the Quake metanode


    I: Camping
    Camping is as much an art as it is a skill. Camping, in layman's terms is the act of positioning yourself in a stationary location on a map in a first-person shooting game, rather than engaging a foe by rushing them.

    Many frown on that type of behavior, feeling that staying in one place shows no skill on the part of the player who camps. Rushing is seen with an honorable light, and with good reason. Rushing an opponent takes bravery, and to survive unscathed takes a lot of skill.

    Camping has unfortunately become a necessity in games as many of the players have obtained superlative connections to the internet, and others must compensate for lack of connection speed. Since this writeup is about camping and not skill vs. computer speed, let me just say that the fact that some can afford a lightning-quick computer and some cannot leads to compensation.

    Camping, in my view, is an artform. If people accuse you of being 'cheap' in a game, or call you a 'camper', this is because you have yet to master camping. The art of camping is in not being seen. It is in finding the blind spots in a level, and exploiting them. A camping artisan would never be accused of camping, as the fallen enemy would never know where you shot him from.

    The art is ephemeral, and to master it, takes nothing more than experience.

    Helpful Hints

    • Find those places that you normally don't look, those spots where if you stood in plain sight you would be overlooked.

    • Shadows are your friend, use them to your benefit when you play. Also choosing a dark-paletted character helps.

    • Corners, corners, corners. Make sure you find a blind alley, or a corner that no one tracks because of their running path.

    • Do not fire until you're sure the enemy will die. A wounded enemy can see where you're firing from. Kill him immediately, and stay hidden.

    • Finally, this hint is specific to CounterStrike: Listen. Your best tool in the game is the radar, and the fact that the enemies make noise when they move. Watch the radar.


    By paying attention to the enemies' tactics, you can integrate 'camping' into your repertoire of tactics and play with a certainty that you're not being 'cheap', you're simply using terrain and combat psychology to your advantage.

    Everquest: The act of maintaining a camp.

    A camp is an unofficial, but widely known and often well-defined area that players can sit around all day at and kill mobs (monsters) for loot, experience, quest items, or for fun. Camps are usually created not long after a new zone (playing area) is introduced to the online world. Players will initially find separate areas of high-density mobs of a certain level that are relatively easy to kill (do not require forces of more than a group, 6 people, to kill) and give them a label based on the common mobs' (often mobs that are similar in name and appearance are at the same camp) names, the name(s) of a rare spawn(s) amongst those mobs, or the name of an item(s) they drop. Over time, depending on proximity, spawn time, difficulty, frequency of use, and other factors of said camps, these labels will merge, remain the same, or disappear.

    An example of camps merging are the Necrosis Scarab and Sebilite Guardian camps in the zone of Old Sebilis. When the zone opened initially, players sat around at the the 'Nec' (Necrosis) camp and the Guard (Guardian) camp in separate groups. However, the guard camp was wedged between the Nec camp and the 4r (4 rooms. Center room with 4 rooms coming off of it with a possible named mob in each). What eventually happened was that the nec camp and guard camp merged into Nec/Guard and it became socially unacceptable to take the guard camp without taking the nec camp. It was perceived as wasteful and your group was seen as weak if the zone had high activity.

    Camps are made and destroyed as the game is modified. If a group of mobs are suddenly made slightly more difficult, the efficiency of the camp lowers unless the experience given is greatly increased. The effect of this is the popularity of the camp decreases greatly and it becomes underused over time.

    Camps can be very flexible given the conditions. If you are taking an inflexible camp (very clear boundaries), but there is nobody inhabiting another nearby camp then your group may pull (tricking mobs into following you to your camp) from that camp over to yours with no social consequences. However, if a group arrives to take the adjacent camp that you're pulling from then you will be expected to give temporary ownership of that camp to them. If you don't, the people in the group trying to take that camp will have a negative attitude towards you, your group, or even your guild (organized collection of everquest players with an established name and reputation).

    Camps can be dangerous. Even though your group knows that they can all handle a camp (killing all the mobs in a camp and being able to kill them when they spawn again), random events may cause problems. Random events like a train (when someone has a trail of mobs following them and they run to the nearest zone line to get rid of them. "Train!" is shouted as a warning because those mobs will attack anyone in sight once the person being chased has left the zone) can decimate a group at a stable camp if they're not careful. To minimize these events, all groups are expected to be courteous and follow a set of nearly-unspoken rules.

    1. Stick to your camp. (Stay in close proximity to it and do not wander)
    2. Leave your camp if you lose a group member and cannot handle it.
    3. If you must train, announce it well ahead of time. If a train made by you kills someone, pay a cleric to rez (ressurection. Revives a deceased player and returns some experience) them.
    4. Call out the name of your camp when asked in zone-wide chat.
    5. Call out the name of your camp when your group's leaving.

    Breaking camp

    Strategies

    Massive groups

    Massive camps

    This is a work in progress.
    Camping is the activity of establishing oneself in a wilderness environment. In its popular context, camping is a recreational activity, although throughout history normadic hunter gatherers, soldiers, refugees, explorers, tramps and people queueing for rock concert tickets away from their regular habitat have been required to create some form of improvised housing for themselves.

    By definition the wilderness does not provide the tools and provisions to easily sustain people accustomed to built environments. Camping is therefore an art, to ensure that people's nutritional, sanitary and accomodation requirements are met, relying on both bushcraft (making use of the wilderness), and the bringing in from outside a wise selection of necessary equipment and supplies, usually in backpacks. As often campers have to carry everything needed, parsimony in what they bring is encouraged.

    Camping is usually associated with other outdoor activities - hiking, fishing, mountainbiking, rockclimbing etc. However people find pleasure just in adapting to a pseudo-rustic lifestyle. Camping as recreation originated in the late nineteenth century as part of the naturalist movement. America's newly urbanised population, now able to think beyond where their next meal will come from, began to notice the natural beauty of their country, and also to regard rural life as a healthier and more wholesome alternative to the cities where they would work in offices or factories. The Boy Scout movement popularised camping in other countries around the world.

    Camping brings with it a whole new class of objects and procedures necessary to sustain life. Tents are used to accomodate campers, who would lie within sleeping bags. Backpacks allow campers to comfortably carry all their equipment and provisions. Traditionally campfires would serve many purposes - to cook food, provide light and warmth after dark. Technological innovations ranging from the Swiss army knife to GPS, designed to make everyday life easier for campers, have changed the character of camping.

    Camp"ing (?), n.

    1.

    Lodging in a camp.

    2. [See Camp, n., 6]

    A game of football.

    [Prov. Eng.]

     

    © Webster 1913.

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