By Smokey
In this I’m going to attempt to give you a basic idea of the styles, tactics, and the basic moves a dueler. Dueling is a big part of tournament play so any one who plans on attending a tournament should have at least a basic knowledge of how to do so. I’m “the father of dueling” so hopefully I can do this without screwing you up too much.
First let’s go into the basic styles of dueling. There are for main styles of dueling. All have their place, and I’m going to try not to be too biased on any individual form. The four styles as I see them are speed duelers, quick-trigger duelers, blocking duelers, and bitch duelers.
A speed dueler is someone who relies on their quickness and accuracy to win a duel. You will know when you play one of these because you will either be unable to keep track of their gun, or you they will just seem to be in three places at once. Speed duelers move out of the path of the laser while hitting you to win.
Quick trigger duelers are a different kind of dueler. Like a speed dueler they tend to stand in front of you. Unlike a speed dueler, they usually like to be as far away as possible from the person they dueling. They rely on the speed of their shots to win the duel. Very few can move the gun while quick-triggering, but the fact that they can shoot so fast balances this out.
Another style of dueling is the blocking dueler. These players usually rely on the fact that you cannot hit them, and they wait for a player to expose themselves before actually firing. This type of dueling requires a lot of patience and accuracy when they finally do shoot.
The final type of dueler is a bitch dueler. It is not really a form of dueling in my mind, but since a lot of people think it is I’ll include it under this name. A bitch dueler is someone who shoots you and instead of staying in dueling runs away then shoots you as soon as either of you come up. Its an effective way to play, but as I said before not the way of a true dueler.
Now I’m going to go into how I would teach someone to duel. First off, POINT YOUR GUN AT THE PERSON YOU ARE DUELING! If you are not shooting at the player, there is no way you are going to hit them. Always keep moving, fake one way and go the other. Lasertag is a sport and like other sports fake moves and jukes are needed. Keep you opponent guessing where you are going at all times. If you move you gun to the same place, or try the same move too many times, people pick up on this and will beat you. Hit what you are aiming at! I have many duelers that could be great duelers lose because they couldn’t hit a sensor. You can have the best moves in the world, but if you cannot hit the target, those moves just delay the inevitable. The last thing I can say for basic dueling is force your game on the other person. This will work for all four types of duelers. If you can make them do what you want them to do, you have already won the game, both mentally and on the scoreboard.