New User Guide

Defly.io : A Beginner’s Guide (to Team Mode)

Objective:

Capture the entire map and eliminate all opponents. In most cases you probably won’t win a game, in which case it’s just fun to expand your team’s territory and shoot other players.

How to play defly.io:

1. Move (W,A,S,D) – movement speed influenced by skill 1 and special ability
2. Shoot (left click or hold the left mouse button for continuous shooting) – shooting is influenced by skills 2, 3, and 4
3. Build towers (right click or spacebar) – tower shields and HP are skills 6 and 7. Skill 5 increases the distance you can build towers from your helicopter. Walls will connect your towers if you build them close enough together and if you enclose an area, you capture the territory!
4. Use special abilities (E or shift) – you get to choose a special ability when you reach level 20

Level UP!

              In order to be effective, you have to level up as quickly as possible. Really, you just won't be productive until you reach at least level 10 or 11. You start at level 0 and can get up to level 32 max.             

How do I level up?

In team mode, you get experience points 3 ways:

1. Destroying enemy towers (by shooting them)
2. Enclosing an area and making it your territory (you only get experience if you capture NEW territory – building towers inside your territory doesn’t give any XP)
3. Destroying enemy helicopters (more XP if the enemy is higher level)

How do I level up QUICKLY?

1. Capture territory by enclosing areas by towers and walls
2. Destroy all enemy towers in your territory (enemy towers in your captured territory are VULNERABLE and can be destroyed with a SINGLE SHOT even if they have high HP and shields)
3. Don’t die (you lose some of your experience when you die)

How do I NOT DIE?

1. Don’t run into enemy walls (you can fly through single towers, but if they are connected with walls, then you will crash)
2. Don’t get shot by the enemy (friendly fire is safe). Also, be especially careful when the enemy has upgraded their bullet speed and distance - you can easily get hit by bouncing bullets!

What skills should I upgrade first?

              This is obviously up to you, but our recommendation is:

1. First upgrade (4 – Reload speed) – this will help you level up faster and shooting is important in this game, so you want to shoot as FAST as possible to do more damage
2. Put at least 3 or 4 points into (7 – Tower health) – building weak towers will get you and your teammates killed, but just a few points into this skill will help a LOT. Your enemies won’t be able to cut through your defenses like butter.

What skills should I upgrade next?

1. Generally, you should decide whether you want to focus on SHOOTING or BUILDING
2. SHOOTING – focus on skills 2,3, and 4
3. BUILDING – focus on skills 7, then 6, and then 5 (if you like the build distance – some people don’t)
4. If you don't want to focus on either of these, then you can customize your helicopter any way you want (see below for some sample builds)

Explanation of all skills

1. Player Speed - How fast you move. This is good for dodging, running away or chasing, and moving around the map more quickly.
2. Bullet Speed - How fast your bullets move. This is very important for fighting if you focus on using your guns because players can pretty easily dodge slow bullets.
3. Bullet Range - How far your bullets go before disappearing. Upgrading this helps with clearing towers and also helps you fight other players. Increasing distance also increases how long the bullet will stay active if it's bouncing around inside the enemy's base, which increases the chances for a ricochet hit.
4. Reload Speed - How fast you shoot. Very important for clearing enemy towers and the most important skill in my opinion.
5. Build Distance - How far away from your helicopter you can build towers. At max level, this allows you to stay inside your base and still build towers outside. This skill allows you to build towers more quickly than you can move, but it is really only useful if you have already upgraded tower health and shields (no point in building weak towers)
6. Tower Shield - How long the shields "turn on" for. Shielded towers cycle their shields on and off. Maxing your tower shields means that the shields will stay on longer and thus be more difficult to destroy. See "How do towers and walls work?" below for more info. (Note: in almost all cases it is better to max health before upgrading shields.)
7. Tower Health - How many bullets it takes to destroy your towers. This is a very important skill because weak towers will create a hollow base that is easy to infiltrate, and will lead to your teammates dying if they think the tower will stop bullets.

OK – I’m in the game and got some experience….. Now what?

1. Cooperate and communicate with your team, using the chat option. To access this press 'enter' and type your message and then press enter again to send. Be careful when typing because you temporarily will not be able to control your helicopter.
2. If an enemy team surrounds your territory they will massacre you – don’t get surrounded. Your team should try to capture territory along one of the edges of the map (or even better, in one of the corners). This makes it much easier to defend.
3. Destroy enemy towers and hunt enemy helicopters
4. Build STRONG towers and walls and expand your territory. Keep looking at the map to see if the enemy is attacking your territory somewhere.
5. When you gain more experience and confidence maybe have different team members specialise in different roles with their skill sets, such as a 'builder' or a 'shooter'.

How do towers and walls work?

•               Walls are invincible – they are only destroyed when their connected towers are.

  

  Weak barrier

•               Towers have HP and SHIELDS. Shields only activate when there is a complete loop of towers. Because of this, long lines of towers do NOT make good use of their shields. If one of the towers in a line is destroyed, the shields go down for all other towers. See examples on right.

  

  Better barrier

•               Enemy towers in your territory are VULNERABLE  - they have only 1 HP and no shields (it still looks like they have shields, but they don’t work). Try to enclose large groups of enemy towers in your territory so that you can destroy them easily.

Great barrier

•               Bouncing shots –when you shoot a wall or a shielded tower, your bullet will bounce off. Bouncing shots is a good way to kill enemies – they might not expect it.
•               Moving from one tower to another (or moving your build cursor if you upgraded build distance) builds a wall between them if there wasn't a wall before. You don't have to press any buttons to do this. The best way to create a mesh barrier like in the 3rd example is to upgrade build distance and basically just spin around to connect all the towers around you.

Now for the important question… How do I KILL people?

1. Shoot them (upgrading skills 2,3, and 4 makes this easier)
2. Trap them in your territory…. Then shoot them (obviously if you can trap them, they can’t run away)
3. Make them run into a wall (sometimes people will panic and do this by accident)
4. The “Clothesline” – build a connecting wall right on top of them or in front of them (if they are moving) so that they run into it. Unfortunately you don’t get XP for killing them this way, but it’s tons of fun.

   

5. Run into them – this actually kills both of you, but it’s possible. When desperate, some people use the [teleport] special ability to teleport directly on top of an enemy, which kills both players. (not recommended)

Which Special Ability should I choose?

              All of the abilities are unique, but some are generally better for new players. We've arranged this in order from most to least useful (in my opinion)

1. Dual fire – you can’t go wrong with this. It doubles your damage, allowing you to destroy towers more quickly (also helps to get XP more quickly). It also helps to break through towers and chase/kill enemies.
2. Speed Boost – another great ability for escaping enemies, trapping enemies, or just moving around the map extra fast. When using this, be careful you don’t crash into walls
3. Teleport – great for escaping if the enemy is trying to trap you. Also, you can teleport into enemy territory and hollow out the inside of their base or destroy their back lines…. Then escape while they scramble to repair the damage!
4. Flashbang – useful in some cases but often ineffective against good players. Unfortunately, it also blinds your own teammates, so not recommended.
5. Clone – most people are not good enough to use this well, and I've never seen someone use it effectively – not recommended
6. Shield – it only lasts for a few seconds, and when you get shot, you usually don’t expect it, so this is pretty much worthless. Not recommended.

I still have questions - what should I do?

Ask your teammates - defly.io players are generally very friendly and will help you if you ask nicely.

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