[1110][Guide] A Phase-By-Phase Analysis of CTF- Part 1, Rushing.

And now for a relative shift from away from teamwork-based antics: the skill of rushing. In conjunction with Gurin, THE knight, I endeavour to provide you with a few of the necessary skills and tricks for effective knight rushing, and eventual capturing of flags. Bear in mind that this guide is solely for Capture the Flag, but some tips may be relevant to take the Halls as well.

However, before I get into the actual guide itself, I’d like to outline my next few guides and what they shall be covering, with the idea being that once finished I will have compiled a full game, phase-by-phase analysis of a typical match of KAG, with tips for both offence and defence included.
- Rushing is the phase in the game where flags remain relatively undefended, 1-2 blocks thick shelters.
- After this stage comes the scaling stage, where bases require scaling or collapsing in order to access the enemy’s flag.
- Finally, the siege stage, in which siege engines/specific constructionsw are almost necessary to gain access to the enemy’s flag.
Throughout the next few weeks, I shall complete each of these three, and hopefully it can be used as canon for at least this build. Once finished, I will compile all three and will be able to send out the file if anyone wants it.

Now onto the guide.

The first, and arguably the most important, skill in order to rush is fighting competence, as you need to be able to defeat the first wave of enemies and push on to their base. However, as this is a massive topic in and of itself, I shall leave this to Gurin’s guide to knighthood, which should be arriving shortly.

Once you have cleared all enemies from the battlefield, it is time to advance to their flag halls which early in the game generally look something like this:

To get inside to grab the flag, you will need one of these many things:
- A builder
- A drill
- In some cases a boulder
- Bombs
- A mine or keg; however these are not normally affordable early game and thus I won’t consider them as useful ‘rushing’ tools, though I’ll still discuss how they can be used if available.

A Builder-
If you are confident with your fighting ability, request a builder accompany you onto the battlefield, and once you’ve dispatched the enemy he should first make it difficult to get on top of the shelter,
then he should start tunnelling into the flag shelter. Then, rush the flag back to base.

A Drill- In the build phase, change to builder and make 2 or 3 drills for you and your knight buddies to use for drilling into the enemy’s flag shelter. If two or more of you survive, drilling in should be fairly simple if it is only a one block thick shelter. If it is more, it will require more time. Always aim for the thinnest point of the shelter, as this will take the least time.

A Boulder- In some cases, a boulder can be an effective rushing tool. This is only applicable when the enemy has used stone doors on their flag shelter, but when they do it can have devastating consequences for them. For more on this, see Darksteel’s guide aptly titled ‘Boulder-dashing’. It explains the technical component of how exactly to use the boulder.

Bombs- If the enemies shelter is one block thick, two bombs is enough to blast your way in. By placing them on consecutive blocks on the shelter, as shown, you can create an entrance into the shelter; plus, if you bomb jump vertically off the second bomb, you can squash anyone waiting inside with a dino stomp (often with hilarious amounts of accompanying curses). The formula for number of bombs necessary is as follows, where n= number of blocks thick of the shelter and b= number of bombs needed: b=n+1.

Mines and Kegs- Whilst it is rare that anyone can afford a mine or keg immediately after the build phase, the rushing stage remains until the enemy’s base requires scaling and the flag hall is better defended.
Mines- Now that mines are cheaper they are a slightly better option to utilise, as any unwary foe may either step on, or shield on your mine. If placed correctly, a mine will tear apart the shelter, leaving a gaping hole through which to enter. Simply place your mine on top of or beside the shelter and either wait for a foe, or throw an enemy corpse onto it, both causing a blast. Simply cap, then rinse and repeat.
Kegs- In order to use kegs, you now need friends to help, and they thus require a lot of teamwork. Grab a few friends and scream “Cover meh!”; if you make it to the shelter, you should be able to blow their base to smithereens. However, as kegs are now so variable, in that they can simply disappear from your very hands, they are not a very reliable option.


This is how to rush, but now how to defend against rushing as a builder.

Traps- Use whatever traps you like in order to deny enemy knights being adjacent to your flag shelter, even simply spiking your shelter can make a difference in stopping drills and bombers. See Kotobuyika’s guide to defensive mining for tricks with mines, plus all the countless trap threads that have been posted.

Knights- In KAG, fighting fire with fire is often the most effective way to defend. One of the best ways to stop marauding knights is thus, more knights. Tell some of your archers or builders to change to knight, and fortify the base while they battle it out.

Phase Shifting- Probably the best way to stop rushers is to as quickly as possible advance your base to the next stage, but then of course, there are different tactics associated with defence which shall e covered in the next guide.

By occupying the roof of their shelter as an attacker, you give time for your builders to push forward, even if you have none of the aforementioned items.

That, my friends, is the phase of rushing.


Attacking-
- Use the items mentioned.
- Builders are effective attackers.
- Communicate well with your teammates.
Defending-
- Sneaky traps and defences are always useful.
- Fight knights with knights, and you should be bought time to fortify.
- As quickly as possible, aim to phase shift your base from the simple, thin flag shelter to the more unassailable base which requires scaling.

Good luck, have fun

By the way, I made a whole heap of screenshots but couldn't put them in. The guide is fairly self-explanatory I thought.

 

Very well written guide! This rush strat is as annoying as hell. 5 minutes in and I lose 2 out of 3 of my flags ._. to 2 knights with drills and a builder supporting them... Hope to see your take on defences since my towers are usually just a copy of franek's ctf tower.

 

Where is the archers?

 

Ah he might have forgotten to put it in. Imo, archers are mainly supposed to grapple to the top of the enemy tower and start harassing builders with arrows and maybe bag a few kills. Loot the builders corpses and bring materials back to base. This also forces builders to switch to knights, slowing down their building!

 

Were there supposed to be pictures? Because I don't see any pictures. Maybe it's just me...

 

You clearly didn't read the end of the guide.

I don't really see a big place for archers in rushing, perhaps the best thing for them to do is to slow down counter-attacking enemies. Don't worry, archers will feature heavily in the next two guides.

 

I apologize, I completely skipped that line for some reason. Maybe I thought it was part of your signature and disregarded it? Who knows? Anyways, great guide, all in all, and I hope the next part comes along soon.

 

It'll be interesting to see how the extra minute of build time affects rushing in CTF.

 

I bet it bends it over and makes vicious, aggressive love to it

 

Well really, rushing is only really viable when a team is too lazy to properly defend their flags. For some teams, the extra minute won't make their flags any more sheltered.

 

Another great guide of yours Ricket!
Congratulations and thanks very much for this .
Bravo!