What Is SHIFT And How To Use It

Fierce commented a day ago

Hi.

I receive a lot of complaints regarding me always using the SHIFT key, so I decided to create a forum topic that explains the idea behind the importance of the SHIFT.

What is SHIFT?

The SHIFT means to move slower than usual and making no sound while you move - this is realized by the "Walk" action in the "Keyboard" tab in the Counter-Strike 1.6 Options, the default Keyboard Key for the "Walk" action is the "LEFT SHIFT".

Why the SHIFT is important?

The SHIFT is very important because it conceals your movement (an element of stealth).

If the enemy can't hear you, then he does not know where you are, and if you hear the enemy, you can figure out the approximate position of the enemy.

The Counter-Strike 1.6 Game is heavily based on the Sound Play, meaning that the making of noise (running, shooting, reloading, switching weapons, picking up weapons, throwing grenades) in a huge way determines whether you kill the enemy, or the enemy kills you.

The Player has more chances to kill the enemy, if the Player hears the enemy.

How to use the SHIFT?

Effectively using the SHIFT takes practice.

The place to start is to start understanding what are you hearing in the Game:

Who is shooting? The Friendly Team or the Enemy Team?

Which weapons are being shot?

The Sound Of Footsteps.

Who is making the Sound Of Footsteps? The Friendly Player or the Enemy Player?

ALSO, THE PLAYER MUST UNDERSTAND THAT THE ENEMY PLAYER HEARS THE ACTIONS OF THE PLAYER - this is very important, I get easy frags because of this, because of the "П - Х SHIFT".

By hearing the Footsteps you can exactly determine the position of the Enemy Player and determine where he is going and what plans the Enemy Player might have.

"How to use the SHIFT?" in more detail:

In my opinion, one of the most important things to be effective in the Counter-Strike 1.6 is not to give away your position.

"Does it mean to hold the LEFT SHIFT 24/7?"

No.

The Player needs to understand where and when to use the SHIFT.

How to understand where and when to use the SHIFT?

The Player needs to understand where the Enemy Player might hear his movement, and where the Enemy Player won't hear the Player's movement.

A common mistake while closing in on the Enemy Player is to start using SHIFT late (too close) to the Enemy Player. In situation where there is some distance between the Player and the Enemy Player, the sound of ONE FOOTSTEP is enough to be ready to "meet" the Enemy Player.

Tell more.

Another common mistake is when a Player 1 is using the SHIFT, and then the Friendly Player 2 runs (no SHIFT) close to the Player 1, and by doing so, the Player 2 gives away the Player 1 position to the Enemy Player.

Is there anything else?

The effective application of the SHIFT is mainly dependent on how the Player understands what is happening around the Player during a round of a map. Each round - different story, the SHIFT application should change accordingly.

Is that so?

Yeah, basically, the SHIFT + EARS + RADAR = the EASY WIN.

By the way, the Radar type should be "Solid" (Options -> Multiplayer -> Advanced... -> Radar type = Solid)

What I have mentioned about the SHIFT is very important, but there is definitely more to the SHIFT, the SHIFT can go as far as Your imagination goes.

...

Also, since we are here, I want to describe a common situation that gets me very much attention:

de_dust2, I am on the T side, CT winning hard, no balance, some time into the new round...

I am somewhere near the T spawn with my Friends, the Friends on the B side get killed, I understand that there is a risk of CT coming from behind (which is like 90 % of the time), so I check if that is the case...

On the T spawn I hear the Footsteps of the CT coming in the search of the frags, I meet the noisy CT with an silenced M4A1, and after that I get many insults.

But what really happens? The CT, that need to camp the bomb sites, are moving without SHIFT through the T spawn, and they get killed (not all the time though), and they call me names - I find this situation very weird.

Anyway, maybe this information will help someone in getting those MAD SKILLZ that we all try to acquire.

Thank you for your attention.