some tips on operators that are best for new players. basically i’d avoid playing operators who are vital supporters (breachers, jammers, gadget deactivators) first because having someone on the team who doesn’t know how to use, let’s say thatcher, can fuck the whole team over.
DEFENCE:
ROOK --> probably the best pick for new players since he has the most passive ability. put down the armor at the beginning of the preparation phase and after that you can do whatever you want. equipped with armor, most operators last longer in a firefight and they will always get downed instead of dying outright, giving you a second chance in case a team mate can revive you. since he’s 1-speed operator, he is also ideal for staying near the objective, in which case you don’t have to worry about knowing the map too much.
DOC --> also a decent pick. you can revive yourself if you get downed as well as heal others with your stim pistol. again, ideal for a new player because you can sit near the objective and heal others when needed.
MUTE --> a bit of a step up now. his jammers jam drones, thermite’s exothermic charge, hibana’s pellets. in addition, anyone sitting near the mute jammer is immune to jackal’s tracking device and dokkaebi’s phone call. now, you’d think that he is best for deploying in the beginning of the match at doorways to catch any drones? well, yes, that’s how most new players play him, but it’s not really good use of the gadgets nor prep phase time. thing is, once you are more familiar with the levels, any attacker can deduce the location of the objective without requiring it being identified by some drone. so at least in the prep phase, trying to jam incoming drones is waste of time. furthermore, deploying them all too early can leave you vulnerable to twitch drone: always wait until the end of prep phase to see if the opposing team might have twitch (has a shock drone that can destroy jammers easily). if yes, try to take care of them before you put down too many jammers.
now, especially if your team doesn’t have bandit (the guy who can electrify reinforced walls), mute is the best thing against breachers like thermite and hibana. so if you place down a mute jammer inbetween two reinforced walls, you ensure that those two reinforced walls can’t be penetrated by thermite nor hibana. the attacker can either shoot your jammers (which generally is difficult since having a line of sight to the jammer generally means having a line of sight to you as well), use twitch’s shock drone to destroy them, or throw thatchers’ EMP grenade to take them out. thatcher’s is the worst because there is generally nothing you can do about it.
tl;dr don’t bother jamming drones with mute in the prep phase or at all (as a beginner), just focus on muting the reinforced walls to make them unbreachable. sometimes i direct mute players to place their jammers in a specific spot, so try to listen to your teammates if they request your jammer somewhere.
SMOKE -->
i actually haven’t played with him, but I think he’s pretty self-explanatory: has toxic gas grenades. excellent way to deny certain entryways to the attackers’ for a limited period of time. particularly useful in the last seconds of the round when attackers are pressured to push in from somewhere. can really deny them this with smoke grenades and win the round thanks to timeout.
this is pretty much it for defenders. most of the other defender operators are either a) just fast, so for best utilization you need to go roaming on the map and this requires better map awareness, or b) have either very useful gadgets or gadgets that, once poorly placed, can fuck up the whole game (castle and mira).
ATTACK:
on attackers’ sides, there’s more freedom to choose since there’s more attackers whose ability isn’t too team-play focused. but here are some operators i advise not to play as a beginner, especially because having these die too early in the round to spawn peekers can be aggravating:
THATCHER - EMP grenade that can take out mute and bandit gadgets. so he is pretty much essential pick for most games as having those EMP grenades can be a matter of life and death as otherwise your team might not be able to breach key locations and you’re forced to rush to the objective through doorways.
THERMITE - main breacher. try to stay alive as long as possible. if you suspect that walls are jammed or see that they are electrified, don’t waste your charges. wait for thatcher or twitch to take care of the jammers. what can happen though is that if bandit is camping behind the reinforced wall, he can start placing his gadget the moment you start breaching. this will actually result in thermite’s charge being destroyed. it’s a common meta trick (also known as bandit trick).
HIBANA - secondary breacher as of now. again, her breaching ability is very important, especially if you don’t have thermite.
MONTAGNE - he’s just shitty if you don’t have communicative team members, since his main value is in trolling the opposing team to the benefit of other team members.
TWITCH - again, people expect you to use the shock drone to get rid of any gadgets (mute, bandit, ela, cameras). better played when you have a sense of common gadget placements and cameras. it usually sucks if a twitch player focuses too much on zapping enemies rather than taking care of gadgets.
otherwise, most attackers are ok i think. rule of thumb as an attacker though: pay a lot of attention to the windows as you approach the building. more often than not, defenders try to net some easy kills by shooting you from the window. whenever you are outside and you hear a sound of some barricade (doorway, window) being meleed, immediately try to see if you can pinpoint that sound to your team member or not. if not, it’s very likely that a defender is attempting to shoot you from some window or jump outside.