One of my playing buddies - MillenniumBlaze - mentioned the same thing. We'd try to sync on a time to play but for one reason or another, we just couldn't get it done. Various game updates had taken place as well - which also caused us some delay. By not knowing about the most recent update, we'd think we'd be playing, only to fire up the PS4 and see both system updates and game updates that would take 1+ hours.
Bummer.
But now Fall is officially here. The days will be shorter. The nights will be longer. There are a group of good games scheduled for release. I'm excited to get back at it. That leads me to the thoughts for today's blog. In R6S, there are "Situations". This are basically practice sessions, but they're very helpful in that they help you hone your skills - and allow you to become more familiar with the maps.
The one thing I did accomplish, over the summer, was tackling the R6S Situations. And here's the thing; I did them in 'Normal' and struggled. I can't imagine doing them in 'Hard' or 'Realistic' -- yet. There are 10 situations - each with a different goal, and each with different operators.
Some situations involved extracting a hostage. Some focused on diffusing a bomb. Others focused on defending a hostage - or being an attacker. Thing is - they really do help you. One thing to keep in mind -- you don't choose your operator, in Situations. While that initially bummed me out - I eventually did come to understand why it's done this way.
By forcing you to use different operators (Attackers and Defensive), you have to become familiar with that particular operators skill set -- and their gadget. What this does is help you select the best operator - when you're in live game play with Terrorist Hunt or PvP. And - by becoming more familiar with all the operators - even if you don't choose them, you'll know what their strengths are, should you come up against them in live game play. In Situations, you go from Recruit to Skilled (operator wise) and you master various types of gadgets along the way.
I found some situations easy and some difficult. For whatever reason - situation 4 "Tubular Assault" was my easiest (and obviously became my favorite). This is a situation using the attacker "Ash" to storm a plane and take out the bad guys. Once I realized I could win at this situation - I went back and did it several times, just to hone my shooting skills.
If Tubular Assault was my easiest, then I must admit Situation 10 "Heavily Fortified" was my hardest. I don't know if it was the angst of knowing it was the final situation or not - but this one took me weeks - literally - to conquer. I'd try it - 5-7 times in a row, on any given night, only to fail. Some attempts were better than others - but it didn't matter because I ultimately failed.
This situation seemed to involve elements of many previous situations. It's set on the "Chalet" map. You have to eliminate several nitro cells (as learned before); you have to breech walls (as learned before); you have to take out enemies (as learned before) and you have to extract a hostage and get him to the safety zone (as learned before). It's the last part that kept killing me. There are a ton of bad guys waiting outside.
I got pretty good at zapping the nitro cells, sweeping rooms on all levels as I engaged the enemies, and picking up the hostage. But getting the hostage from the 2nd story - to the safety zone outside was quite the challenge. I ended up dedicating one night to just this mission. I was tired of losing.
I began to approach the situation differently. Since I became so familiar w/the inside of the building - where the traps were - where most of the enemies were hiding, etc - I decided to focus more on the challenges that are outside.
I didn't care how long these missions took - I just needed to know the terrain.
I went around the chalet; deep into the woods (even found a campfire); and covered every square inch of the outdoors. This helped in a couple ways - it made me more familiar with the outside, and gave me an 'idea' of where the bad guys were.
Well - I'm happy to report - I beat situation 10!!! Make no mistake - this was my single greatest accomplishment -- not only in R6S, but in my short time playing ANY PS4 game.
It was huge! And yes - I celebrated. Hard! And, to my surprise - there was a bonus situation that only revealed itself after I won situation 10. It was the situation that first depicted "Bartlett University" and after the mission brief - I was teamed up with 4 people online (whom I'd never met or played w/before - but who also recently completed their situation 10). We went through the bonus as a group - and we won! It was crazy good.
I'll be posting my situation 10 on the GWTC YouTube channel soon - and I'll also post the bonus situation, as both were kick-ass confidence builders for me.
In the past year, R6S has undergone major updates/changes. I look forward to attacking them all, very soon. I'll also attempt to go back through my situations - this time on "Hard" to see if I can get even better.
If you're an R6S player - new, or intermediate - take some time and play the situations. It's a judgement-free zone that sets this game above many others. Play one situation repeatedly - or take 'em as they're presented (you can't jump ahead until you've completed all previous situations), but play them. I actually hope they update the situations to include some of the many new maps that are available -- as the current version of situations only lists the core original maps.
If you've tried or completed R6S situations - hit me in the comments. What was your most difficult? Which was the easiest - and did you find this method of practice helpful
Until next time - thanks for rockin with GWTC!
-Coach B.
