Battlefield 3:Recon Sniper

Alright well I decided to write this up because a friend of mine was watching me play when he came over to my house and was in awe of how I transitioned to play the Sniper Class without every really playing sniper in other games, BF2, COD, etc. I went 33 and 10 in a single round and he was just shocked asking how I did it, so I suppose I'll share...

Before anyone asks I'll post up my credentials, and again I'm not claiming to be an UBER-AWESOME sniper just a good one, especially considering the transition I made from a medic assault rifle user to pure-headshot recon, again I only started playing recon because I found it to be the most appealing class to play when your'e gaming solo, which I often do:

(SV98):

(M98B This was done in 1:45)


Stats:

Ok I'll try to list future screenshots to pinpoint exactly what I'm talking about but for now I suppose I'll just list Pointers/Suggestions.

Recon Snipers in real life are creatures of habit, and so should you be as well soldier! This means you need to be consistent with what you're doing to the highest level to reproduce consistent shooting. So if you're adjusting or changing things STOP IT!!! You need to go with something that works or that you think works, and learn how to make it happen and not adjust things. If you need pointers on what to equip with ask me or study the leaderboard, lol.

Let's start with equipment I personally use an ICEMAT (Glass Mouse Pad) I swear this is more important then the actual mouse where I suggest you just use some laser mouse, any will do. I personally use an older G7 or G700, based on my preferences. The Icemat allows me to move fluidly and consistently I will NEVER GAME without it. Try to stick to a select few servers where you can gauge on what your ping is and become consistent with it (Again Creature of Habit). You get use to the server you understand how things work such as lag and you make the adjustments and things become second nature to you. Now the Rifles, I personally suggest Bolt-Action, I'm from the camp of the One Shot-One Kill. To enforce this I started playing with the m4 burst-fire engineer gun worked on headshots over full automatic guns (G36c /A91). I eventually got use to the idea of going for headshots only then transitioned over to the Bolt Action Recon Rifle.

So You have your rifle now what? Well try to get a bolt action rifle specifically the SV-98 and only go with either the (Rifle Scope or Ballistic Scope) DO NOT USE ANY OTHER SCOPE THEY ARE GIMMICKY IMO and you want to become standardized to the sighting as these 2 scopes are ALOT easier to get then the other Gimmick Scopes. Once you've become accustomed to these scopes it'll all be second nature. DO NOT ATTACH ANYTHING IN NUMBER 3 slot, MEANING NO SILENCER NO TACT LIGHT AND NO LASER. All of these give away your position badly notify your target that they are being targeted or create a MASSIVE BULLET DROP. ALL of these are bad, so don't do it ok? Remember we are in the business of One Shot One Kill.

How do I find my target? Try hiding in a secluded area and use your MAV to locate targets over your Scope. If you have to use Scopes then try getting use to the adjustments of in and out vision to avoid tunnel vision. Once you find your target SPOT IT! hit Q. Many snipers don't actually spot their targets before sniping in fear of a kill steal, however You should spot your target to get the nice Orange Triangle above their head and try to gauge in on the distance or where that triangle is on your scope to get that headshot. This takes practice but I PROMISE you once you master this you'll thank me and be relieved. It helped because you can all of a sudden Semi Quick scope on lurking enemies. What I mean is sometimes I'll get targeted by an enemy sniper and he'll have the jump on me and damage me to 40% health. His problem? well he's not using Bolt Action and he didn't graduate from the One shot One Kill Camp that you have currently attended

So you spot him while ducking for cover etc. Then quick scope him gauge the orange triangle Correctly then BOOM HEADSHOT! Of course this is all done at proper distances but I promise you it'll work well if you try working headshots with the orange triangle placements.

TIP:I personally never suggest being an one particular area for any more then 3 kills, keep an idea of what's going on in the map/battleground and try to snipe zones that I call are buildup zones, where you'll often find support guys camping out running their chain-guns/Mortar all day. I've killed so many camping Support Guys it's unreal. I don't suggest ever camping too much, you gotta move around support the team and only camp if the team is stuck in one particular zone, but if you're a good recon sniper you should be able to get your team unstuck

perk1: Only use Soflam on Rush it's worthless IMO on Conquest unless that one tank is REALLY bothering you. ON urban maps go with the TUGS especially if you think you're camping out on a corner or stairwell and MAV on open maps. Use the MAV as much as you can meaning find targets with your MAV think greedy. Most recon snipers think MAV is the replacement UAV well it is but you can use this for your advantages for you Solely and just find targets for yourself so go up and go straight down, use it like a parascope.

Lastly you can be offensive don't think you can't take flags, try scouting a flag with a MAV then approach it with a pistol. But only do this when you're semi/very comfortable with your rifle.

Keep this up and you should be a good recon that will actually be beneficial to the team

In the mean time, please avoid sniping me if I see you out on the battlefield

PS: Belive it or not I was debating on either to put the straight pull perk in at number 2 or not, but I've gotten so good at one hit kills with the M98B that I no longer need a Straight Pull, I generally make the bullet count and don't need a 2nd shot at 250 meters and less. So Bipod is ok, although I've never used one, I either had nothing there or StriaghtPull, but currently I don't need anything but straight pull is in there but I'm generally too shocked when I miss to even bother firing that second shot. My M98 stats are astounding when compared to my SV98 which goes to show that the Method Works! Please Add suggestions or tips you might have/Comments. But this is as much as I can currently think of, Thanks For The Read, and I hope you gained something, I apologize if it was a Bore for ya

 

True Weapons of a Killer

 

+1 for the weapons above.

 

Wanna add Spawning:

Spawning is an issue with recon especially considering you get a Spawn Beacon (Unswitchable perk 2) so you Better Use It! and Use it Wisely! I don't suggest you hang out within the same area as your spawn beacon ever. Bad things can result such as the enemy camping your spawn only to get knifed or shot up again. Try to place your beacon in closed areas (To avoid Parachute in, I mean talk about giving your position away)

Always try to lay your beacon before you start sniping, Why? Because it's really annoying when your squad mates spawn on you while you have a nice thing going and they start shooting off giving away your position drawing a TANK to shoot in your area....

So what exactly is a good location? Any location that is hidden so as the beacon won't be destroyed, and a location where if you were to die in the spot you are currently at the person who just killed you would have no real idea where that beacon currently is located (assuming you haven't been stalked)

So anyways lay the beacon away from where you are even consider defensive spawning inside containers is a GREAT spot... And Before you start squeezing off a few rounds. The Spawn beacon is no joke and don't take it lightly or for granted I currently have just under 80 knife kills, and guess what? They all came from the spawn Beacon.

What ended up happening is I'd get over-run by a squad (4 on 1 go figure, but hey at least I was pissing them off enough to send 3-4 guys after me so I'm doing something right? aren't I?) Anyways they kill me I spawn on my beacon and guess what? I knife the whole squad from the rear as they think they've cleared the area only to get stabbed in the Back by me, Literally.... Nothing is more enjoyable then knowing you've knifed someone but only to have the helpless individual watch his kill cam to see you knife another one of his squad mates. Such Joy Even better then the Acclaimed Headshot!

 

I'm using Razor Destrutor pad + Diamondback 3G
longest headshot was 591m and I have no idea why I'm having a black guy on my stat page

 

Just wanted to say thanks for the tutorial. I'm currently level 16, played an assault medic class exclusively to this point and wanted to start getting a feel for playing a sniper. I never knew about marking targets using 'Q'! I'll try that out and work towards unlocking the Bolt Action rifle right away.

What are your thoughts on the sniper perches in some maps, such as atop the oil refineries, Objective C in Operation Firestorm, or on top of the Bridge by Objective B in Canal. Are places like that, high and hard to reach, worth the time to crawl on top of? Or are snipers better off lying in the ground?

 

Pretty nice write up. I agree with the surface being really important. For a while I was playing on a leather armchair armrest. I sucked bad. Then I switched to a desk with a Razer Kabuto mat. I'm still not good but it's a lot less frustrating.

 

Avoid doing going to those locations, why? because they're too time consuming and the kills you get aren't really worth it. You ONLY do this if the server is swinging one way as in BLOWOUT and you're bored. To really bring in the essential skillsets of sniping I suggest playing Rush before Conquest and then try your best too apply what you've done/learned in Rush into Conquest Maps. Snipers who hang out on those perches are free kills for snipers such as myself. I only suggest playing in mountain tops, high-hills and survey Flags. Vehicles are also worth sniping. Believe it or not I have a rather high number of drivers I've shot out of vehicles. Secondly, with the amount of disabled vehicles that go on instead of just blowing up you'll find alot of engineers repairing their vehicles that are begging for headshots and vehicle theft.

Getting back to the whole Perch thing, generally you're going die right away after a kill due to Kill Cam, that's why it's not worth going up to high locations. Also, you're probably going to end up killing low levels or individuals who have no clue as to what's going on in the server meaning it didn't really mean a whole lot in team effort in terms of killing them. Objective is to win the round foremost. As you practice and get better I assure you that you'll start to climb the leaderboards or scoresheet list as I have

Another thing about sniper purches, I hate to admit all my secrets or play habbits but I guess I will for the benefit of this Sniper School I'm Conducting ... But I often hide My MAV on those perches when I go idle with it, as compared to keeping it on the ground close to myself. So what I do is I scout, hide it up high on some tower or smokestack, do some sniping, hide acess the MAV and resume scouting. I feel as if there are VERY few recons who actually scout for themselves and targets as I do. Why do I feel that this form of recon is better? It's more beneficial to the team this way, and you're not wasting your time looking at empty hills all day

If you want to hide on Flag C of Operation Firestorm that's fine actually, Just I don't ADVISE going to the highest Point, going to the second highest point and snipe from that location, you just don't wanna make yourself an easy/identifiable target.

FYI I rarely get sniped by other snipers, I generally snipe those campers it's possible that those kind of snipers account for easily 25% of all of my kills

 

I personally like the m40a5. It has less bullet drop than the sv98 and "loses" less damage on longer range compared to the sv98. It is however damage wise inferior to the m98 but that weapon just feels weird to me.

my 2 cents

 

Me either, and I can't wait to try it out.

 

I bypassed using this rifle only because when quickly glancing at the leaderboards almost none of them use the m40, I admit in MOH I used the M40 nonstop as well as Battelfield Vietnam. However the M98B drops your target and when it comes to solo playing or Recon Attacking (Over Recon Flag Defense) I prefer the M98B. When you drop your targets with this thing you feel like a bad azz . Take a while to get use to I admit, but I hit an EUREKA! yesterday posting KD ratios of 33-10 21-9 back to back amongst rank 35+ users on urban maps last night. So you could say the M98B is my new weapon of choice and I'll be using this rifle on the battlefield.

 

Lying on the Ground: I never really camp out lying on the ground unless I'm in a heavy traffic zone or am avoiding fire. (Meaning I NEVER SCOUT A LOCATION WHILE PRONE)I always try to stay mobile and move around I only really go prone to take that shot especially at range to add accuracy. (This could be because I don't use a Bipod)

Resolution: I know alot of people are big on graphics and things looking their absolute best MAXIMUM EYE CANDY. I however use my R2 system with dual 5870's and have reduced my resolution to 1680x1050 I think or something like that. The graphics don't look as Crisp but I get ALOT more FPS and I just know it's easier for me to snipe at this resolution as compared to the max 1200p. You gotta do what ever is comfortable for you. And believe me even at this apparently bad resolution my friend was impressed wth my Killed Logs coming in constantly at the bottom then the graphics of how the game looked

 

It is hard to draw a bead or distinguish an infantryman at extreme ranges with low rez, though.

 

Not with a Ballistic Scope, and I have about 25 kills between 400 and 450 meters. How much range do you want to go?

 

1680x1050 isn't that low. I'm talking about 1366x768 on a 15.6 inch screen with a native rez of 1920x1080.

 

im running the game at 1080p. just for the ffun of it, i tried sniping at 720p on my 720p lcd. couldnt even destinguise anything beyond 600m.

at 1080p my longest headshot is 883m. 1080p + decent graphics definitely give u the long range edge in sniping.

 

1080p and the min graphics would probably be better, except draw distance set to max if that affects the distance that people are rendered as well as other objects. if it's just other non-competitor objects, i would turn that down as well.

maximize framerate, minimize clutter

 

When I play on my laptop I basically can't play above 720P and all low settings, so long distance sniping can be somewhat annoying since I literally can't make small enough cursor movements because the pixels simply aren't small enough.

Also even though I have over 20 percent accuracy with all of the weapons I actually USE for some reason my global accuracy is under 10%, which makes no sense at all. I think it might have something to do with spraying the T88 LMG all over the place and not hitting anything, although I haven't used that gun anywhere near as much as my top guns. Also it seems to count the accuracy of the shotguns in a strange way; i.e. the pellets seem to count as individual bullets, so if any pellets miss (but you still get a hit indicator) it will count as a significant number of misses. Because of this my benelli 1014 accuracy is only 9%, even though I hit someone pretty much every time I fire.
The accuracies for my top 4 weapons are 20.82%, 19.88%, 24.83%, and 36.89 percent. This adds up to just over half of my total kills, but somehow my global accuracy is still in the toilet.

Interestingly, my most accurate weapon is not a sniper, but the Rex Revolver (the 36.89% accuracy with 116 kill currently).

My M40 accuracy is just under 35%. It was at 37 percent before, but I spent too many rounds trying to get absurdly long marksman headshots so it has suffered a bit.

 

Not to be a debbie downer here, but it is VERY easy to scope in BF3 and BC2. Not sure why you would need a thesis on the subject, but thanks anyway.

when you can scope like this, well then you are good, lol:

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Why did you just post a COD4 quickscoping video in this thread? This is about BF3.

 

I guess my point was it is pretty easy to scope in BF3 /bc2 so it seems a bit redundant to make a thread about it.

It would be similar to say,.. making a thread about the perfect way to chew bubble gum-- put it in your mouth and chew it -- that kinda thing.

So I thought I would post some good scope shots from a LAN tournament from Europe (in honor of scopes/snipers out their), feel free to post more of yours as well.

BTW Mjoiner that is a professional player, playing in a LAN tournament for 50,000 Euro. Not a quickscoper,lol.

 

I was under the impression that "quickscoping" in COD was right clicking to zoom in with the scope only until the crosshairs get close together (when you zoom in COD the crosshairs get closer and closer as you are zooming in), then firing before fully zooming in. This "pro gamer" does this a few times in the video.

 

Of course he is good, he is a P.r.o.f.e.s.s.i.o.n.a.l. On that note -- not trying to toot my own horn -- I can go 60-4 in BF3 scoping. I understand this forum as more of a 'super casual' gamer forum, well I get it -- but it is still a gamer forum, about gamers, and the way they game.

 

There are few things dumber than quick scoping in FPS games. Something that should never have been allowed to happen. Just shows that game developers don't even bother going to a firing range to actually see for themselves how guns work. Probably only take a few hours out of their work day to do it.

Also no use comparing sniping from COD to BF3. You can't quick scope in BF3 and unlike COD, in BF3 guns have some kick back. And rate of fire in BF3 is limited. Even with pistols you can't fire as quick as you can in COD, since in BF3 first there is the kick back, secondly the game just won't let you fire as fast you can click the mouse.

Also in BF3 they actually have reload speed, unlike COD. So if you miss trying to no scope in BF3, you'll probably die. Get picked off while you are trying to reload. In BF3 if you try to scope and shoot someone before finishing reloading, you have no bullet. You can't just scope immediately like you can in COD. Even if I'm 3/4 finish reloading and I switch guns in BF3, BF3 says nope, didn't reload.

Lastly in BF3 you have to take account for bullet drop and speed. If you are such an expert on sniping you'd know this. BF3 also takes into account for movement, meaning the projection of the bullet is affected by gun movement itself. So quick scoping even if it was possible in BF3 would equal a miss every time. In BF3 you can't just target a moving target like that "pro" is doing in COD, BF3, he would have missed probably 95% of those shots.

I agree with mjolner, discussing gun mechanics in COD in a BF3 thread is pointless.

 

Ok for Clarification I didn't want to get into a debate about this but if you want to so be it. You cannot go 64-4 in BF3 just sniping, Show me the Gamelog of this and prove it. You're either cheating or EXAGGERATING to the Highest level. I've played with some Damn good players and they don't come to Ratio anywhere close to that especially as a Recon. Bf3 is about the Headshot, if it was a one shot kill other then the headshot the M98B would have done that, and quick scoping would work, but it's ONLY HEADSHOT for single kills and some luck. Please Troll somewhere else... I gave suggestions cause some people asked me for it, and if you read through the comments they thanked me. Not everyone can go 64-4 so I was sharing some tips. Why dont you explain exactly how you went 64-4 cause I'd love to hear it other then going to noobie servers with 1000 tickets and setting up a camp... And sharing COD youtube videos. Share with all of us how you exactly went 60-4 as purely a recon just scoping because I'm sure MANY people who have read this thread would be just as interested in this as I currently am.

 

Just can't get over these lies.... Battlelog of this please. I've never seen a recon get 60 snipes in one round and only die 4 times..... in BF3 There are VEHICLES buddy.... And the recon has no form of Anti-Tank just dying 4 times in a full round is already an accomplishment in terms of it takes skill and some luck to do that (Which I don't doubt you or anyone may have). But putting up 60 kills while doing that is next to impossible you have a sniper rifle and a pistol if you went 30-4 you'd have pissed off the whole server to the extend where they'd be gunning for you specifically, and just you. Throw on another 30 kills and who are you playing and what server are you on? One with Zombies who only try to bite you? Or were you playing SP/Co-Op where you went 60-4? In that case CONGRATS!!!! Mission Accomplished.

 

Let me get you a cookie...

 

wrong section kid

boy is mad cause his mw3 resulted to be just mw2.5, LOL

 

He may be a professional player, but I'm not sure how that negates the fact that he is indeed quickscoping.

 

Being in a tournament with a $50,000 prize (or prize pool) is hardly sufficient to make you a professional.

 

How much of a difference does the type of mouse matter when playing such close or long range weapon usage games?

I can appreciate the skill aspect, still people seem to be spending a lot of money on specialized mouses, some of them look rather odd to hold lol (maybe something getting used to)

I have a standard M-UAV-DELL8 laser mouse and I can say its not the very best or steady or maybe its just me if the mouse doesn't matter?

 

Once you get a gaming mouse with multiple DPI settings you can't go back; it is just WAY easier to snipe at a lower sensitivity. The sensors in high end gaming mice also are a LOT more consistent and can handle faster acceleration.

 

*Whistles something about a 731m HS with the M98B*

Battlelog / Sign in

(Oh, and I hatehatehatehate the svd. I really do. The only reason I use it is because I still have some unlocks to get for that and the m40, which I find to be meh. After 400m or so the m40's bullet drop gets way more pronounced and always throws me off)

(And FYI: People get mad when you sit outside the RU base on Capsian Border CQ and shoot people in the head at the US base. But on the flip side its like 700 points per hs)

 

You can also significantly remove recoil and change the rof of any weapon you want as well. ... The reason why there is an artificial max rof on certain weapons.

You can do it via software with any other mouse but those thing often trip up on some games anticheat.

 

Alright so I was ready to let this thread get buried and long forgotten but I just had to say one more thing. So I'm on my 1,000th kill with my sniper rifle actually 1,130 something And I found a Glitch, now mind you this is a IN GAME glitch, not me hacking or modding, glitch. It's completely within game and I think anyone can do it, or maybe just my PC with my settings however.....

Well I present you my new crosshair, can you see it? Yeah I'll pretty much hit you straight in the head and quick scope you with my m98b now

I would spill the beans on the glitch but seeing as how people just wanna trash talk or what not I'll just let them feel a few pointers from a .338 Lapua if you catch my drift

Back to COD style quick scoping fools in the servers, who really needs a scope?