This is just a primer. If you don't know how to play at all, you should read another guide (after finishing this one).

• Your starting loadout consists of 0-1 primaries, any number of secondaries, and 0-1 handgun skills.
  
• You get 11 points to spend on the above, and have no benefit keeping unspent points.
  
• Win by killing to earn Notoriety (score); but specifically by killing stylishly (weak weapons/multiple weapons/environment/unarmed) and in a row (killstreak bonus).
  
• Assists also gain some notoriety based on your weapon and damage dealt. Similarly, finishing off a weak enemy gives lower notoriety.
  
• Spend money to get special weapons at weapon crates. There are blue, red and yellow crates, yellow containing the most expensive ones and blue the least.

• Stand still while you shoot, but keep moving when you are getting shot at. Does not apply at point blank and with certain weapons.
  
• Respect the kick (press ALT), the most potent and risky move you can make. If you connect, your enemy is damaged, still and helpless for a moment. If you miss, the helpless person is you.
  
• Jumping while kicking is even riskier and even more potent.
  
• Drink whiskey (glowing bottles around the map). They heal for 25 but make your view drift for a while.
  
• Fanning and aiming gives you an advantage in close and medium range combat respectively, but entering the mode takes time, time which you may not have.
  
• Headshots do bonus damage, but is not lethal save for specific weapons. If your weapon demands it, go for it; otherwise it's more important to land a hit than to go for the headshot.
  
• You can run very very briefly without losing accuracy. Not too useful though.
  
• Howl (C+5) or Laugh (C+1) to establish dominance. Bonus points if A N D E L E.
  
• Spam Pass the Whiskey (X+4). Do it for the memes.

A high-capacity, low damage weapon (3-4 shots at medium-close range) with mediocre accuracy.

The high capacity makes it good when engaging a lot of people on a busy server. If you can reliably land headshots, this weapon improves dramatically as you can now potentially two-shot up close; otherwise it's on the weak side for a primary.

• This can be a great backup for the Dynamite.
  
• Wear Boots for a good close-range finishing attack.
  
• Take the Left-Handed or Right-Handed perk if you are a headshot guru.
  
• If you want to dual wield this, there's always Ambidextrous.
  
• Fanning increases your close range lethality.

The most well rounded starter pistol, the Navy is a 3 shot at medium range and readies itself quite quickly.

The versatility this weapon has allows you to comfortably take potshots at people, but also be a threat up close. There's really no wrong way to use the Navy.

• The Boots are, as always, a strong tool for close-range combat.
  
• Handgun Throw is a great close range finisher as well, if you have the points to spare.
  
• You can take both this and the Dynamite as well - this is as expensive as you can get.
  
• Lastly, I personally love using Left-Handed or Right-Handed for that extra mid-range capability.

A melee weapon amongst guns, but certainly not to be underestimated. The hatchet does 40 damage (56 on a headshot) and kills in 3 hits, and has many setups for reliable killing.
You also run faster with this out, so chase people all you want.

Chopping at your enemy alone is too slow - you'll be kicked away and blasted to bits. There's a few combos you can do to get a kill:

• (With Boots) Hatchet + Kick + Hatchet/Throw
  
• (With Derringer) Hatchet + Kick + Shoot in face
  
• Sliding hatchet + Kick + Hatchet/Throw
  
• Thrown hatchet + Kick + Punch
  
• Kick + Thrown hatchet headshot (risky!)

The kick is your most useful attack, as it locks your opponent in place for a followup hatchet hit or throw. Be very careful though - players expect hatchet users to kick, and will either anticipate your approach and kick first, or try to juke your kick and follow up with their own.
Being too formulaic won't help you. Mix up kicking, throwing and the Derringer to outplay your opponent's options. Remember that any three attacks of yours (except non-boots kick) can kill a full health enemy. Picking up other weapons can also give you an additional fighting chance, and surprise the enemy who expected a melee-only opponent.
The headshot is quite tricky to land - you have to aim for the head hitbox and not just the general area. For this reason I don't recommend trying to go for it, as you have no lack of damage.

• You will be kicking a lot with how close you fight. The Boots are practically mandatory.
  
• Do you like throwing your hatchet? In case you miss or lose it, the Brass Knuckles keeps you from being an unarmed target.
  
• Knives are kind of redundant, but gives you extra things to throw.
  
• Not the throwing type? The Derringer and its combo may suit you better.
  
• Slide to close the gap and get extra damage in.
  
• Use Jumpmaster to get around the map and score high damage kicks. You can use it to round corners at a high angle, getting the literal jump on enemies, or to take shortcuts offensively and defensively.

A dual-barrel shotgun needs no description - walk up close and pump them full of lead. Capable of doing up to 60 point blank (75 headshot), and gets a very fast two-shot kill compared to other starter weapons.

The Sawed-off is powerful but suffers from its low ammo count. Two shots is sometimes just slightly not enough to kill someone, so you want to consider a secondary source of damage. Usually this means dual-wielding with a Derringer or something you pick up, but you can also consider using Sliding and/or Boots. Reload constantly and don't engage more than one person at once if you can afford to.

• Handgun Throw is a good combo - shoot and throw for a kill, though this is risky.
  
• Sliding can be an option to close the gap so you can ensure a consistent kill.
  
• If the Navy is not your type, you can also bring the Dynamite with this...
  
• Dual wield with the Derringer for a one-two punch.
  
• Since you want to dual wield as much as possible with this gun, take Ambidextrous.

A curious oddity among various firearms, the bow shoots arcing arrow projectiles instead of hitscan bullets. As a result, it is difficult to use but does good damage as long as you charge it fully. It's also a one-hit headshot, deadly in the right hands. It is also a very high scoring weapon, so it's not as hard as you may think to top-score with it.

The bow is best at medium range, where you aren't pressured into firing too quickly. Try to predict movement and aim ahead a bit - but it all comes with practice.

• Brass Knuckles if you inevitably get into a brawl and don't want to be a sitting duck.
  
• In the same vein, Boots helps.
  
• If you're not a punching person, the Knives can be thrown for a close-range fighting chance.
  
• The Derringer is also a backup and finisher weapon to consider.
  
• Jumpmaster is very stylish, but also practical for juking enemy shots up close.
  
• You can charge the bow while Sliding, which can help you get a first shot off by surprise.

A pair of lightweight revolvers. Pitiful damage (3-4 shots at close range) but readies extremely quickly and maintains decent accuracy even on the move. Used to be a single weapon at 2 stars; you now get 2 at 5 stars, allowing you to go rambo right after spawn.

One hammerless may have trouble killing, but it is not a question with two. You want to use your superior mobility to close the gap while firing off shots, then get up point blank for maximum damage. Combine with a kick to finish them off. Be aware of your quickly spent ammo, and reload often.

• Two guns? Ambidexterous is a no-brainer.
  
• Since you now have to play this like a Hatchet that can sting, Boots gives you that extra damage you may need to finish enemies off.
  
• the Hammerless is quite light, so Handgun Throw may seem weird, but it can fit in with Boots and you can get a last ditch attack when you spend all your rounds.
  
• Soften enemies with this before following up with Brass Knuckles. Bonus points if you punch a better weapon off your opponent.

A more costly but precise weapon, the Army has higher accuracy and damage at the cost of an extra point and slower handling. Compared to the Navy, it is a 2 shot at medium range instead of 3.

The Army is great at mid-range combat, and none of the starter weapons except the Smith can compete at that range. Keep your distance and fire away. While still potent up close, be wary of being kicked and not being able to get a second shot off.
If you have the Boots, an opponent after being kicked can be finished off with a well placed headshot.

• Wear your Boots and kick away anyone who wants to get personal.
  
• Handgun Throw can offer finishing damage, and is very useful in situations where you get kicked.
  
• Sliding is a great mobility option to also help with close range combat.
  
• As with the Navy, Left-Handed and Right-Handed make you more precise.

Where the Army shines at medium range, the Mare's Leg shines at close range. It does a preposterous amount of damage (up to 70 bodyshot), and has 1-shot potential on a point blank headshot.
The tradeoff is its lower accuracy and slower firing speed, which have to be compensated with.

This gun is better the closer it is to your enemy. Get up as close as you can without being shot, and try for a headshot or a bodyshot + kick combo. Think of yourself like the Terminator, and get real personal with your enemies. When close enough, you don't even need to bother with stopping to aim.
At medium-close range you can still 2-shot, but it's slow and you are outclassed by the other pistols.
This gun is heavy, so you can throw it for a good chunk of damage even when uncharged.

Recently this weapon has gotten a huge nerf, upping its cost by 1 and making its firing speed even slower. Because of this, going for headshots is more desirable since you can easily get outgunned by the time your second shot is ready. You also can't bring Boots + HT + Left-Handed together due to the cost now, so rip.

• Boots is mandatory here as well.
  
• Handgun Throw is an excellent finisher for when you can't get close enough to kick.
  
• Left-Handed is good if you want a better chance at headshots.

The Smith Carbine is the Scout of FoF - long range rifle that can one-hit kill with a headshot. You only get one shot though, and the cost is quite prohibitive.

You need to go for headshots. While two bodyshots can kill, you won't often have the luxury to reload a shot when your opponent closes in. In the case where that is not possible, use your other damage options to finish them off after landing a bodyshot, such as a thrown Knife, kick with Boots, etc.

• Kicking does wonders to keep your enemy away, and you know what the Boots does already.
  
• While you can no longer use the Derringer with this, consider the Knife - you can throw them to do about 30 damage to finish off a weakened enemy.
  
• Brass Knuckles can also serve as a backup weapon, though without the Boots it isn't as good.
  
• You can Slide and then aim for a stylish kill. Useful when you know where an opponent is, or entering a high traffic area of the map.

Hold F and click to throw your handgun, causing damage based on charging time and weapon weight. A good finisher tool when your enemy is low or you run out of ammo, but particularly good for the Mare's Leg, Sawed-off and Remington Army, all of which need the finishing touch and have the weapon weight to boot.
Note that recent nerfs have made this nearly unusable when dual wielding.

Thrown objects disarm enemies and cause extra knockback; you don't drop objects on damage. The main use of this is throwing explosive barrels and other props around. Very situational and map dependent, but fun! Also note that thrown object kills have really high notoriety scores.

Reduced fall damage, and you get a wall jump with increased kick damage (40 without boots and 50 with). Mainly useful for juking shots, this is great for close range engagements on maps with lots of verticality and close quarters, where that extra kick damage really, uh, kicks in. Works best with the Hatchet, Brass Knuckles, or Bow, as they do not worry about the jumping accuracy penalty.

Turns your fists from a last resort to a dangerous threat. You can punch handguns out of people's hands if you hit them in front, and damage is increased.
You can either bring this for backup with a long range weapon, a second option for close range weapons, or don't bring a primary at all and go all-in on fists - it's surprisingly fun!

A set of melee weapons. They do not do much damage - 35 on a thrown hit and 30 on a stab, but serve as an additional option to finish a wounded enemy in case you run out of ammo, or threw your gun or hatchet. Note that you can and should go for stab headshots (42 damage) but the thrown knife cannot.

Straight outta Apex. It's a great tool for closing the gap when you initially encounter an opponent, as long as you don't slide past them. Shooting while sliding is both cool and effective - it's the only way to get normal accuracy while moving (other than the horse), and can let you get an extra hit in before a duel begins. Requires momentum to actually slide, so you can't do it immediately from standstill, and you can't do it with too much encumbrance or with heavy weapons (Sharps, Pump Shotgun etc.).
Sliding melee damage is increased by 15% (Hatchet does 46 up from 40, machete 69 from 60), enabling a few combos that don't require boots. While you can't start a slide while aiming, you can slide and then aim/fan. This makes slide a useful mobility option for most loadouts if you can spare the cost, but is especially helpful for loadouts that need to close the gap.
Oh and it gives you faster draw times for some reason.

The kick is to be respected, and this makes your opponents respect it more. The extra damage (35 up from 25) is a great finisher, enables a lot of lethal combo setups, and the knockback bonus (while small) helps get enemies off you and keep them still for a headshot follow up. A useful choice for almost every loadout.

Two shots in a tiny package, does 30-45 damage per shot at close range. Creates combos with many weapons, like the Volcanic, Sawed-off, Mare's Leg or Hatchet.

Explosives are fun. You get two and they give a lot of Notoriety on kill. If you like them, use them along a cheap primary or melee; otherwise just stick to the guns.
Remember you can always get more regular dynamite from blue crates, deadlier black dynamite at red crates, and the meme dynamite belt at yellow crates.

You can pick one of the following skills, and it defaults to right handed if none is selected. If you do not select Right-handed, your alt-fire for pistols is fanning.
Note that the alt-fire is only usable on specific revolvers. The Derringer, Sawed-off, and Walker are examples of weapons that cannot use them - but they still are still affected by accuracy.

This is the default handedness option. Right click enters an aiming state where you move slower but can fire accurately.

Higher accuracy bonus when using only left hand, at the cost of much lower dual wield accuracy.
Most useful on guns that enjoy mid-range fights, would like to land quick headshots (so Right-Handed aiming isn't viable) or have somewhat low accuracy, like the Army, Peacemaker and Mare's Leg. If you pick up guns to dual wield often, don't use this.

Accuracy bonus when dual wielding. However, your accuracy is slightly lower than other handgun skills.
Pretty much a must-have when you plan on dual-wielding.

Lowest accuracy among handgun skills, but fanning accuracy is improved. Used to be quite terrible, but after all the buffs it is now a seriously powerful skill that gives you a strong edge up close, especially with the Schofield and Peacemaker. Consider taking this if you expect a lot of indoor fights and don't plan on dual wielding.

Blue crates contain the cheapest purchasable weapons, some of which are straight up starter weapons. They allow you to bolster or switch up your loadout at minimal cost, but aren't that special otherwise.

Use it as a backup weapon, an extra Hatchet to throw for your melee build, or as something to run fast with.

Despite the name, this seems to only give one Hammerless pistol. A cheap option to dual wield with.

Two sticks of TNT! You know the deal - light the fuse, throw at your feet, etc etc.

There's not really a reason to separately buy a bow unless you lost your weapon somehow.

An excellent choice to dual wield with, and goes particularly well with high damage weapons like Mare's Leg, or another Sawed Shotgun.

There was a time where this was a starter weapon, and man those were fun times. The Schofield combines the best parts of the Army (good damage and precision, full cylinder reload) and Navy (fast firing and good handling) into one reliable package. The only downside is its rather prohibitive cost post-nerf, which makes it not very cost-effective.
One makes you dangerous, two makes you unstoppable. If there was only one reason to go for blue crates, it's this.

The Yellowboy switched places with the Smith Carbine more than one time in the history of FoF. It's a great long range rifle with a ridiculous amount of shots, but the damage is kind of low. It is like the CS Autosnipers, I guess.

Red crates contain premium weapons that you can't afford to buy every life, but are great ways to improve your score as they are both powerful and have decent notoriety gain. It also contains the portable whiskey.

Are you a team player? Do you want to get on the good graces of your teammates or just to get them to stick around longer? Pass this whiskey around (no dizzying side-effects) and keep them alive! They'll be there to save your life (sometimes) or be a bullet sponge (all the time).

A full-length shotgun that can kill very easily in two shots even at medium range. The problem is that it only has two shots. Works the best when you are in a position to back off and reload. Probably the second strongest weapon in the red crate, and a cheap option to extend a killstreak or to use against a pump shotgun user.

A set of 4 upgraded dynamite with a bigger and more lethal blast. This is your go-to if you see a big group roaming around, or if you're a true dynamite enthusiast.

If the Schofield is a blend of the Army and Navy, the Peacemaker is a Navy turned up to eleven. They handle similarly, but the Peacemaker has more pep (2-shot medium-range) as well as the coveted one-hit headshot. It's a powerful revolver and definitely the most reliable of the red crate picks.
(Also there's a super cool spinning draw animation.)

It's what black dynamite is to dynamite, what the Peacemaker is to the Navy. Extra damage allows this to easily two-shot to the chest, and it is even viable on the move. A great choice for bow lovers, but may not be worth the risk for the rest of us unenlightened yankees.

The solid middle child of long range rifles, the Spencer does 60-70 reliably on bodyshot and can one-hit headshot medium range. You can rarely go wrong with something as powerful as this, assuming you can hit your shots. However, be aware that the damage still does fall off over extreme ranges.

Only one yellow crate exist in a map, and it contains the most powerful weapons of the game. Generally, you go for these with the intention to start or extend a killstreak, as these weapons have a relatively low base notoriety gain. You also gain a small heal when buying these.

A lot of shots, very light. Not too cost efficient, but it fits in many loadouts and is great to dual wield with.

A curious weapon, the yellow dynamites thrown by this weapon is infinite, has a (random) short fuse, but also weak and with a small blast radius. A fun gimmick if you're into that sort of thing. Most useful in places where you have a height advantage and can toss them at unsuspecting (and suspecting) passerby.

By all means an upgraded hatchet, the Machete does 60 damage instead of 40 - allowing for a 2-shot, but not quite 1-shot+kick without either the slide or the wall jump. For this reason, I think this isn't the wisest purchase; but it's still a highly potent weapon for the melee enthusiast.
And if you're the throwing kind, this thing has a one-hit headshot and ~70 bodyshot. Sweet.

Remember one section above where the Coachgun's downside was it only had 2 rounds? Well this has triple that, and is about as deadly. Clean house against multiple enemies, or just feeling like lobotomizing your brain and blasting some dudes? It's all here.
Your mere presence will be intimidating, as your opponents won't have room for error - two shots (3 if you're that bad) and they're history. Unfortunately, while easy to kill with, you can still be outplayed by a fast killing combo or headshot.

If the Henry is the Scout, then the Sharps is the AWP. One hit kill on everything, and also bearing the only scope in the entire game. I really don't need to talk about how great it feels to delete people from existence. It's really heavy and slow though, so don't get caught out of position.

A somewhat inaccurate and ridiculously slow to reload revolver, but it's a one-shot at close range, and very dangerous close-medium still. Has the best multi-kill potential out of all weapons in the game.
Bonus points if you use this with Left-Handed for that extra accuracy.

By no means exhaustive, and you should modify as you see fit.

Not all loadouts spend all 11 points, and you should add secondaries and handgun skills that you prefer.

• Hatchet + Derringer + Heavy Loads: A weaker version of the hit + kick + shot combo, but still capable of killing.
  
• Hatchet + Boots + Brass Knuckles: Brawl with woeful disregard to your axe's ownership.
  
• Hatchet + Boots + Knife: Throw a lot of things.
  
• Brass Knuckles + Boots + Knife/Slide: Full-on brawler. Scavenge every weapon and cause a mess.
  
• Hatchet + Boots + Slide/Jumpmaster: Zoom around and make it personal.

• Navy + Boots + Handgun Throw + Any Handgun Skill: Flexible in all situations, as default as it gets.
  
• Mare's Leg + Boots + Handgun Throw/Left-Handed: My "Terminator" loadout. Bonus points if you get a second Mare's Leg and blast people's faces off.
  
• Sawed-Off + Derringer + Ambidextrous: A one-two punch for the bold.
  
• Hammerless x2 + Boots + Ambidextrous/Jumpmaster: Get running and gunning, close and personal, other words that mean mess them up close.

• Army + Boots + Any Handgun Skill: Also flexible, but more geared towards longer range engagements.
  
• Smith Carbine + Boots, Knife or Brass Knuckles: One trick pony whose trick is "shoot and don't get shot at".
  
• Bow + Boots + Slide: What is this, some sort of Apex Legend?
  
• Bow + Boots + Knife: My go-to bow loadout. The knives and boots help you not be helpless up close.