Firefall New Player’s Walkthrough

Firefall New Player’s Walkthrough by FadedPez

Hello and welcome to the Firefall beta! We are very excited to have you as a part of this critical stage in Firefall history. Feel free to post your impressions, suggestions and bug reports in the designated areas of the forums. Keep in mind that this is all still a work in progress and things are subject to change based on feedback.

Logging In

Once the Firefall client is installed (or patched) and you launch the game, you will come to our login screen. Use the same credentials you would use to log into the forums to access your beta account.

Create a Character

Click the “Create” button to create your new character. When you create your character you can select from the following options:

• Sex
• Skin Color
• Face
• Eyes Color
• Hair Style
• Hair Color
• Facial Hair (Male only)

Also, you can designate your name/callsign as well as your preferred voice set and battleframe.

IMPORTANT: The battleframe you choose at character creation will be the battleframe you begin the game with.

Once your character is created, ensure it is selected from the “Select Character:” dropdown and click “Play.”

Playing Firefall

Basic Controls

Nav Wheel

The Nav Wheel is a way to get around to different features in Firefall. Press the tilde key (`) to bring up your Nav Wheel. You can use your mouse wheel to scroll between the different options available to you. You can select things such as Inventory, Calldowns, Notifications, Social, and Versus. Left click selects the option highlighted. Right click takes you back one menu.

First Timers

The first time you load a character into New Eden, you will find yourself flying into Copacabana on a drop ship with a little bit of intel from Aero. Once the dropship lands, you have two main options:

Open World Content

You can follow Aero’s instructions to navigate to different waypoints that ultimately bring you to a SIN tower. You can follow along the missions that are called into you via SIN to unlock your first thumper. After unlocking your first thumper you can explore the world searching for the best resources to build your gear and other goodies.

PvP

If you are more interested in starting out by playing PvP, navigate to the first waypoint Aero gives you. From there, you should see some PvP terminals on the building across the way from the stairs. Interact with the PvP terminal to select the type of match you would like to queue up for.
Alternatively, you can press the hotkey K to bring up the menu to queue for PvP.

Check the box next to the map(s) you would like to play and then click “queue for selected maps”. You earn an XP bonus for queuing for multiple maps. The more maps you queue for, the greater the bonus!

To learn about the different PvP gametypes and maps, click here.

If you only have time for a single match, don’t forget to uncheck the box at the bottom of the queue screen that enables Auto re-queue after a completed PvP match.

Observe Matches

You can observe live or past matches of Firefall at any time. Access the PvP queue screen, at the bottom there will be a menu for “Watch Matches”.

Clicking the arrow next to the match will show details of that match including the Match ID. If you share the Match ID of your favorite matches with your friends, they can input that Match ID in the search bar to quickly access those particular matches.

Live matches are on a 60 second delay from the action.

Notifications

Certain things will trigger notifications (for example new missions being called in, squad invites, friend invites, etc). You can bring up your notifications by pressing N. If you have multiple notifications, you can scroll through them with the mouse wheel.

Squad Up

Everyone enjoys playing games with friends. Invite your friends to your squad by navigating to the Social section of the Nav Wheel selecting Squad Invite. Alternatively you could use the command /invite and your friend’s name. For example:

/invite Phobos

To accept an invitation you could press N to bring up your notifications and left click to accept the invite and right click to decline.

You may be on a separate instance of New Eden than your squadmates. In order to meet up on the same instance, use the command:

/joinleader
Squads are limited to a maximum of five players.

Friends and Ignore

To add a player to your friends list, use the /friend command as such:

/friend Afex
The other player will receive a notification must accept the friend request. They will have to press ‘N’ to bring up their notifications and left click to accept or right click to decline.

In order for the friendship relation to be fully built, the other player must also add you to their friends list and you must accept the request.

To ignore a player use the /ignore command:

/ignore GodOfBiscuits
We found out GodOfBiscuits is actually really awesome so we can unignore him by using the /unignore command:

/unignore GodOfBiscuits

To access your friends list, bring up the social menu on the Nav Wheel (default hotkey ‘O’). Then left click on ‘Friends List’. This will show a list of your friends’ names, their current battleframe and status.

You can also view your ignore list by selecting switching the tab right above your list.

Progression: Spending XP

As you earn XP, you will see the amount of “spendable XP” you have in the upper left hand corner of your HUD. In order to spend your XP, you will need to access your personal tech tree. You can do this by pressing the hotkey T.

The colored/lit certifications denote certifications you have unlocked. Red denotes certifications you are able to unlock due to requirements but you do not have enough XP.

Dotted lines represent “or” paths. Shown in the diagram, you only need either the Kisuton Sniper Rifle or the Principles of Plasmatic Resonance certifications to reach Hazardous Plasmatics Handling I.

Solid lines represent “and” paths. Shown in the diagram, you must have two certifications to unlock the next one along the progression path (ex. Astrek Ammo and SIN Manipulation Class I are required to unlock Accord “Raptor” Recon Frame).

Unlocking a certification grants you a base item tied to that certification with the exception of battleframes. You must purchase new battleframes through the Garage.

Each battleframe (not class) earns XP separately. That is to say Recon Battleframe XP is different than Accord “Raptor” Recon Frame XP which is different from Accord “Nighthawk” Recon Frame.

Loadout Customization: The Garage

After you have unlocked your first certification, you can equip your new item in the Garage. Access a Garage Terminal by interacting with it. Your character will be shown in the Garage. You can select various parts of your battleframe to upgrade certain modules.

Chest: Plating, Processor, Abilities
Arms: Signature Weapon, Signature Weapon Ammo, Secondary Weapon, Secondary Weapon Ammo
Boots: Jumpjets, Servos
Backpack: Reactor

An upgrade example would be unlocking an ability. You click on the battleframe’s chest to zoom in and bring up the options. Then click Ability 1 or Ability 2 (whichever order you wish to slot the ability). A list of abilities available to that battleframe will be shown. The one you are currently wearing is highlighted in yellow. Also a card with the equipped ability’s description will show up. Mousing over an unequipped ability will bring up a second card to show you a side-by-side comparison of the abilities. You will also see the constraints associated with each item. Select the item you wish to equip by clicking on it. You can get out of the submenu by clicking on an empty space in the Garage or pressing Esc. To save your loadout, simply exit the Garage.

To learn more about the Garage, click here.

Constraints

Each item consumes an amount of constraints. Battleframes can only accomplish so much depending on their tiers. There are three constraints:

Mass (dictated by the battleframe)
Power (dictated by the reactor)
CPU (dictated by the processor)
When creating your loadout, if you exceed your limit on any category, your loadout will not be valid and you will need to make the proper adjustments to ensure you are within the constraints of the hardware.

Changing Battleframes

If you own multiple battleframes, you can change battleframes by interacting with a battleframe station and selecting the desired battleframe for the situation.

Duels and Challenges

You can issue a duel by accessing the Versus submenu from the Nav Wheel and scrolling down to the “Duel” option. Left clicking will issue a duel to the person located at your reticle. Alternatively you can issue a duel to a player by typing /duel and the player’s name. For example:

/duel Thrasher
To accept a duel, access your notifications on the Nav Wheel. You could also press N to bring up your notification window. Left click is used to accept the duel while right click will decline the duel.

Squads of any size can also duel each other. Squad leaders issue and accept duel requests the same way solo duel requests are issued and accepted.

Full five-person squads can also challenge each other to PvP matches. In order to challenge another squad to a match, navigate to Versus on the Nav Wheel and use the Challenge option when targeting your opponent squad’s leader.

Alternatively you can use the command /challenge and the squad leader’s name. For example:

/challenge SloppyDrunk

To accept a challenge, bring up your notifications by using the Nav Wheel or by pressing N. Left click accepts the challenge, right click declines the challenge. Once the challenge is accepted, each player of both squads must “ready up”. To toggle your ready state (default is not ready), bring up your notifications and left click.

Open World Resource Collection

Currently there are two main methods to collect resources in the open world: sonic detonators and thumpers.

Sonic Detonators

The first thing that needs to be done is to equip the sonic detonator. Use the Nav Wheel to access your calldowns. Alternatively you can use the hotkey C to bring up your calldowns quickly. Select your sonic detonators from the calldown list. This will put the sonic detonators in your fourth ability slot. When you locate a resource node, use the hotkey 4 to throw a sonic detonator at that node. After the explosion you can run over the resources to pick them up.

Thumpers

In order to make the most effective use of thumpers, you must first scan for resources with your scan hammer. Equip your scan hammer by going to your calldowns menu and selecting the scan hammer. This will be put in your fourth ability slot. Explore the open world and use the hotkey 4 to use your scan hammer to detect the nearby resources. Once you find a spot you are satisfied with, you can call down your thumper.

To call down a thumper, go to the calldowns menu and select the desired thumper. Press 4 to display a movable hologram of where the thumper will land. Use the mouse to aim to the desired location and then left click to confirm once the spot is satisfactory. The thumper will gather resources but also attract a lot of undesired attention.
Manufacturing

Access a Manufacturing Terminal and click the + button to add a manufacturing slot. Click Load to see a list of nanotemplates available. Select the desired nanotemplate and click Load. If the required resources are present in inventory, the Manufacturing Terminal will build the item. Once it is done, click Unload to add the item to inventory.

To learn more about Resources and Manufacturing, click here.

That about covers the basics of Firefall. Please check out the hyperlinks to items you wish to learn more about. If something is unclear, just ask!