Camping in Call of Duty

[dimples]

What is your opinion on it? Do it yourself? Hate people who do it?

[Steph]

I do spend my time getting really angry at campers. They're especially common in hardcore.

I have tried it but I actually suck at camping. Then I thought to myself, despite how annoying they are it must take some sort of skill to camp somewhere out without being found etc?

Still doesn't stop me from hating them haha.

It's so frustrating.

[Jason]

Most campers I don't mind, as long as it's not an exceptionally cheap spot (ie somewhere where there's no realistic way of being able to get to them).

However, spawncampers are the scum of the gaming universe, alongside online cheaters. Not so much an issue with MW2, where the spawns are spread around the map, but with something like Battlefield: Bad Company 2, it's a huge problem.

[Daggers]

I've never really seen the point of getting annoyed at people for camping. At the end of the day it's just a different style of playing the game. If you can do it, do it well and do better than your opponents because of it isn't that what competitive gaming is all about?

I mean a team of 4 friends playing regularly on a single game, versus a different team of random players across the globe each time is going to destroy their opponents on every match because they've found out a way to work together effectively to win... Maybe that too frustrates other people? I just don't get it.

You play, you die, you respawn, at the end of the day it'll make you become a better player won't it?

[Diachron]

Camping is one of those hot-button topics!

As Daggers points out, one should theoretically simply accept that combat is a by-any-means-necessary activity, and as such, camping is a valid tactic (albeit a non-symmetrical one!).

Others may refute this by saying that combat games should be treated like sport, not actual warfare, and as such, camping is not a gesture of good sportsmanship.

I think at the end of the day campers will be campers and camp haters will be camp haters. Some games have anti-camping weapons*.. maybe a better answer is to make camping an attribute of the lobby you're joining or setting up.

My own opinion? I like to camp against NPCs in single-player, but I prefer to be a bit more reckless in multiplayer, in the interest of keeping things energetic and fast-moving.

...Although every time my friend says "camping is a legitimate form of play!", I have to resist the urge to taze him. :lol:


* = like the Farsight XR-20 (http://www.giantbomb.com/guides/perfect-dark-weapons-faq/164/) from Perfect Dark. Shoot through walls, and give campers the what-for! ;)

[MyNameDidntFit]

The only time camping ever annoys me is when it's either spawn camping, or AWP camping in CS. The latter is more that the weapon itself is so gorram cheap... stupid AWP.

[JustaBitOutside]

I think it's just a way that some people play the game and you have to make adjustments. Lots of people seem to expect other gamers to play a specific way. I think that's relatively non competitive. You should be able to adjust to other peoples strategies no matter how lame they may be. Someone's camping? FIND HIM AND KILL HIM, heck maybe even use that microphone on your ear to organize a strategy.

[Jason]

The problem is, camping is often a by-result of poor level design or poor weapon balance. Sometimes both. In the case of the AWP, as MNDF points out, it's a stupidly powerful weapon, and unless you're regularly carving up Scoutzknivez servers, you're going to struggle against even the greenest of the green if they're carrying it.
In other cases, I've seen ridiculous (dev-constructed) levels where the only sniper rifle in the map is positioned behind lots of cover at the end of a long, narrow and brightly-lit corridor. The map essentially dissolves into a race for the sniper rifle at the start, and whoever gets there first pretty much wins the round.

I actually really enjoy a good, tense sniper battle. This is why it irks me that MNDF lives in Australia, land of the absurdly high ping (hush MNDF, we both know it's your fault really...), because I know he does too.
However, I hate sniper matches with too many players, (which seems to be the only way console games offer the sniper match) as there's no real skill to it - you spawn, you sprint like hell to the nearest cover, and you poke your head out every now and then to shoot anyone dumb enough to be trying to change position. You get bored, you poke your head out once too often, you get shot. Repeat for ten minutes until you slit your wrists.

[MyNameDidntFit]

and unless you're regularly carving up Scoutzknivez servers
And even then you'll get killed by bastards with the fucking thing.

But most of the time when I wasn't on scoutzknives I'd be running around with an M4 or an AK or somesuch and then some bugger would start AWPing and I'd gently imply that he should stop. After some verbal sparring in which they tell me that if I don't like it I should play -sniper servers, I would kill them. Repeatedly. In the head. And then stab them for ultimate humiliation.

Damn, I kinda want to start playing CS:S again so I can get as awesome at it as I used to be... :/

I actually really enjoy a good, tense sniper battle. This is why it irks me that MNDF lives in Australia, land of the absurdly high ping (hush MNDF, we both know it's your fault really...), because I know he does too.
Aye, Arch enjoys this too. I recall a time when he and I modified the hell out of our Crysis configs to make it the perfect stage for some Enemy at the Gates style sniper warfare -- only the best maps for it were too... large. Still awesome fun, though.

[Jason]

Yeah, in my book the main difference between 'camping' and 'sniping' is that camping is generally done with the intention of achieving an unfair advantage, rather than sniping with the intention of achieving an advantageous position through good positioning and your own skill with your weapon of choice.

[dimples]

I understand camping with a sniper. You are no good with a sniper running around. But you should still change places even if you are a sniper.
In Call of Duty 4, on some levels I use the sniper and camp somewhere near a flag, and secure it so that my team members can get it without being shot. Then I move away.

Other than sniper campers, I hate them!