PUBG Mobile is a very fun game to play, based on the Battle Royale genre. This has already become a new trend in gaming, many of the popular PC, Console games have also jumped on the bandwgon and now you have Battle Royale modes in popuar games like Call of Duty as well. Check the complete list of best battle royale games for 2018.

Anyways, back to PUBG, PUBG Mobile did a great job at porting the PC version of the game to mobile, did that in a way that attracted a lot of PC & console gamers (like me) and seriously battle it out with some of the best gamers on a new platform – your phone. The recently conclucded PUBG Mobile Star Challenge Global Finals was awesome, RRQ Athena from Thailand won the tournament. Check official PUBG Mobile Youtube channel for streams of the tournament.

That brings us to the topic of how to get better at the game, I have been playing video games for a long time now and one thing I have learned is to excel at a game you first need to learn the game. There are many things in each game, the knowledge of it helps you to master the game quicker. So here is a list of 10 things that will improve your game,

1. Play with headphones.

Lets start with the simple stuff, DONT’T EVEN ATTEMPT TO PLAY PUBG MOBILE WITHOUT HEADPHONES, while this is true for most FPS games, it is super important in PUBG Mobile, the audio from the sorroundings of your charachter is very helpfull to get knowledge about what is around you. You can use audio to pin point location of nearby players, wether they are jumping, what guns they are using, which car just approached you, when somebody pulls the pin on a grenade, the list is endless. Every action in PUBG creates a sound which is unique and good headphones will help you to find it.

2. Understand the guns, attachments and recoil patterns.

Brace yourself this is a big one!

Recoil.

For people who have played CSGO and such FPS games, recoil pattern is a not a new term. When you point at a target and hit the fire button, the first two or three bullets will hit the target but the next 10-15 will be in the sky, as the recoil of each bullet causes the gun to go higher and higher. This effect is exponential and the bigger the scope the more drastic out of control your gun will go. Learning to control the recoild will help you control your spray and hit target without stopping after each bullet fire.

So the question becomes how do you control recoil?

The first thing is practicing pulling down the fire button gradually instead of keeping it at the same spot. The other thing is Gun attachments - compensator & grips help you to reduce this recoil as well. This will ensure when it is a 1-1 gun fight, you try to land as many bullets as possible on your target before them. The game provides certain attachments, some generic, some unique to certain guns which help control this.

Attachments.

Muzzle attachments in order of improving recoil & value add.

• Compensator - Reduces recoil & no sound reduction.
• Suppressor - Slightly reduces recoil, less sound, and no flash.
• Flash Hider - No recoil reduction, No sound reduction, removes flash.

Grips & stocks in order of improving recoil & value add.

• Half grip - best recoil control.
• Vertical grip - better than most, but hlaf grip works better for me.
• Thumb & angled grip - Slightly reduces recoil.

Stocks and Bullet Loops.

• Tack stock - for M416 - Must have for M416, else switch to SCAR-L
• Cheek pad - for sniper riffles - reduces recoil and improves aiming.
• Bullet loop - for Kar98k - Improves reloading spped.

This may sound too much, but good thing is auto pick will mostly pick up these things for you, all you need to do is remember the preferred option for each type of gun.

Here are my simple rules,

1. Always take Compensator over Suppressor and flash hider.
2. I like Half grip over vertical, but you might prefer other. Go to the training mode and check what feels natural to you.
3. For sniper riffles, I often prefer Suppressor over Compensator as it is often a single shot and stealth is important.

Guns

Lastly guns. They come in all types in the game and each has a time and place. Some guns you will find in abundance in initial loot phase like Shotguns, Vector, Pistols, Tommy Gun. In the initial phase when everyone is trying to find a loot, even a shotgun is a big advantage against someone without any helmet & armour. UZI and UMP are IMO highly underated guns in initial game phase, even though the have 9mm bullets which dont do much damage but their firing speed makes up for everything.

But these guns are what we call close combat guns and wont stand you a chance against ARs in mid range.

So, try to find guns for two cases, close to mid range and other for long range. You have your 5.56 and 7.62 ARs, which are shredding machines in proper hands. One of your guns has to be a AR, you wont win a lot fo games without having one.

3. Rendering distance, lag & strafing.

You dont see me!

Actually I do!

Redenring distance is a very important concept to understand. Essentially your phone/device is going to render the environment around you based on how far you can see, so you might feel that I am lying in grass or hidden behind a bush, but guess what for someone with a 6x or 8x scope from around 200m away, you are lying on ground without any cover, the greenary will not render for them but your charachter will, hence you are just a sitting duck!

Strafing is also very helpful, it means moving your player left-right around the same spot while standing still out in open. ex: while looting a crate, you should always strafe, even if slightly it improves the odd of someone watching you loot that crate will miss his shot.

So some rules which should be obvious but are not are,

1. Never lie down when you are getting shot at, best is to run & jump in a random manner.
2. Allways take cover behind solild objects like rock, trees or buildings, never trust grass and bushes!
3. Always strafe while looting, or cover your location by a smoke.

Sometimes you will get a lag when you are moving, that is nothing but your player render radius just came in contact with a player, as soon as this happens the device/game tries to load all the info of that player (his clothes, car, guns, location, etc) for you, and this causes a sudden surge which is nothing but the lag you encountered. This is often helpful to locate enemy.

4. Loot locations and Map Knowledge.

The game has three maps Erangel, Miramar and Sanhook each designed to suit a certain style of gameplay. Erangel & Miramar are huge maps, while Sanhook is half the size. The best tip I can give for new players is to not get overwhelmed by the map, instead do a trial & error and try to find a location which suits your gameplay. When you are new, you can start with a less crowded locations, which will allow you to loot freely and get settled in planning the game.

In the map below,

• Blue - Top loot spots.
• Yellow - Medium loot.
• White - Not much loot.

Top spots will give you a higher probability to find top guns and higher level items, but if you will notice on the map these are few locations and very tightly packed, so expect a lot of fighting initially and that too with good players.

Spots in Yellow are many and are scattered thoughtout the map so no longer the plane path you will be able to find one of them. Here you wont find good loot immedietly and will have to search a many buildings scattered in a slightly larger area to find loot that works. But as you see, these locations are not as dense as blue ones which means you can hide and engage players selectively, these are good locations to start.

Spots in white are even more spaced out, these are small small group of 3-4 buildings. There is very less chance that you will find top loot here, but atelast you wont be killed the moment you drop.

Try to sample different spots each time you drop, it will give you an idea about vehicle spawn points, hidden loot locations (some compunds in white zone often have top loot) and improve your map knowledge, you will soon know every mountain, road, building in the map.

5. Circles, Red Zones and Rotations.

PUBG like anyother Battle Royal Game, is first and foremost survival game, last man standing wins. It doesnt not matter if you kill 1 or 10, it would matter more if you finish 10 or 50, that is what your ranking will be based on. At predefined intervals you will see a circular bluezone and a white safe zone, your objective is to get to the safe zone as bluezone will drown your health. As game progresses, damage to the bluezone also increases, last few circles will kill you in give or take 10s. All in all, getting stuck in bluezone is a strict NO, esepcially early on when you are starting and unware of buildings and hiding spots.

Which brings us to Rotations, if you are lucky, your initial landing location might be the spot for final circle, but that is a rare thing so better not count on it. Rotations are important but timely rotations are even more important, if you rotate early you will find that buildings and hiding spots in the safe zone are empty but you will have to fight to keep it from players who arrive late. On the other hand, if you rotate late, you are more likely to challenge for a safe location. Which further points to #3, if you have better knowledge of the map you know where and where not you are likely to enoucter someone hiding.

6. Figure out your loot preference and style.

This is not really a PUBG thing, but it is more about how you like to play a FPS game, if you have played one before you know your style already if not dont worry you will figure it out soon enough. It will matter if you are a sniper who likes to engage long range, a ambush player who hides and pounces on someone, a fragger who actively seeks out fights.

So then, why this matters in PUBG?

It matters becuase how loot is structured in PUBG, unlike other games where you get a fixed 100 point health along with guns and ammo, PUBG’s loot is far more layered. You have different guns which require different shells, 7.62mm, 5.56mm, 9mm, also some special cases like 0.300 Magnum for AWM, .45 ACP for Tommy gun and Vector. You carry all this in a backpack, along with your consumables(health and boosts) and grenades. As you cannot gaurantee same loot in each game, you will have to tweak your style for each game based on what you have got.

Each item takes up space in your backpack and hence if you carry more of something you have to carry less of something. There are 3 levels of backpack, 1 carries less, 3 carries the most.

My preffered loadout,

1. One Short - Mid range AR - In order of preference M416, AK, SCAR-L with anything from red dot - 3x scope.
2. One Long Range - Any bolt action sniper(Kar98k, M24, AWM) if not then a DMR (Mini, MK14), worst scenario another AR in single tap fire mode with 4x - 8x.
3. #1 Ammo -> 180-200.
4. #2 Ammo -> 50-60.
5. 5-6 drinks
6. 5-6 Pain killers
7. 3-4 Health Kits.
8. 4 Grenades
9. 3 Smokes

Based on the recoil patterns and attachments discussed in #2, you cannot go on assembling things you never are going to use, so if you get a AK and want to use it, dont bother picking up attachments for M416. Idea is to keep your preference order in mind, and start looting to get what you need to be in the best shape as game progresses.

Last point is, Grenades & Smokes are underrated, especially in final circles when you dont want anyone to see your movement, you can use them to attack as well as a distraction.

7. Taking advantage when you have it.

This is more true for squads then solo games, in squads you first knockout a player and then you kill. While a player is DBNO (Down but not out aka “knocked”) he can crawl to his mates for a revive which takes 9sec, after which he is on minimal health(<10%) and has to immidietly heal. What you need to realize is that this activity blocks two players, one is already down and other is reviving him and hence cant shoot. So if you are a 4 member squad you need to push the other team in this 9 secs, as only 2 players on the enemy team are active. The more players you knock form other team the higher your advantage, in such cases ignore the players who are knocked and target the ones who are alive, as killing them automatically kills the player who is knocked.

In solo, this situation is different, there is no DBNO in solo, you get instant kill. So if you hit someone, depending on your gun and wether it was a body or a headshot, it has brought down their health significantly, at this stage if you dont push them. They can heal and continue the fight.

This is more important during rotations and challenging for a safe spot, you need to make sure you need to grab any advantage you have.

8. Game of hitpoints.

Check this reddit post for damage each weapon does

PUBG is essentially a game of hitpoints, by using your health consumables (Bandages, Health Kits, etc) you can regen your health, by using your boosts (Pain killers and energy drinks) you can boost the speed at which your health regenerates. What you cant do though, is repair your damaged Armour or Helmet (unless you find a new one). Once you take a body hit, it takes away certain hitpoints from armor, same for helmet when there is a headshot.

Level 3 gear gives more resistance, but againts top sniper guns, even that is of no use and you need learn to realize how much damage a gun does, a quick thumb rule is, larger the shell more damage it will do. So 7.62 will do more damage than 5.56, 5.56 does more damage then a 9mm.

• AWM headshot is a instant kill, even for a Level 3 helment.
• Kar98 & M24 headshot is also almost as powerfull, but is not instant kill for level 3. But level 2 (which is most common) is a instant kill.

If you are on receiving end of either back off & heal, as most often you wont survive the next shot.

TLDR, the game is simple, when you are fighting you are trying to drain your enemy’s hit points faster then they can do the same to you. So your aim atleast for couple of shots, needs to be on point as any headshot will do more damage than a body shot, and once you know you have dealt good damage, push!

9: Finish the kill.

Which brings us to an important point, knowing when to engage. The game is a last man standing, so kill anyone you see who doesnt know you have seen him. Let me explain this further, when you see someone and they have not seen you, you have a big advantage over them as they have no idea about your location. Here if you decide to kill them more often than not you will succeed.

But if you know that you cant finish the kill, better to not do anything and observe their movements till a time you can finish them confidently, this also requires knowledge about the guns you own, the damage they can do, etc. If you have a decent ARs, you would want to engage the enemy close to mid range rather than long, if you have a SMG the distance needs to be even closer, so be intelligeint and dont just give away your position if you know you cant finish the kill.

10. Approach the safe zone, surfing the bluezone.

This is the last and most important tip I can give. PUBG’s safe zones are popular for hard shifts, forcing you to go all the way from one end of blue zone to another. In later circles if you dont have a vehicle you will get lots of damage from bluezone.

The trick here is to know that both the circle meet at the same time. Which means the larger part of the circle will close faster and slower part of circle will be slower. So in such cases, move towards the edge of the circle which has the least distance to the safe zone, this way you can often out run the zone easily and egage anybody if needed.