Contractors Showdown (C:S) is a great game. It's very polished even in this early state (as of writing), and it plays precisely how a VR royale should. That being said, in its short time on the store, it's accumulated *a lot* of sweats and players with an absurdly high skill level for the hours they could possibly have put into it.

I'm going to share everything I've picked up in my short 7 hours. I'll continually update this guide with everything I learn going forward, but right now I have a lot of things I wish I had known going into the game.

I'm not going to share precise numbers, or anything really picky about the meta. This is a really new game, and everything is subject to balancing especially now. I'm not going to crack the game every time it updates, comb through update logs, or manually write down tested numbers. I would rather spend my time in the game, learning how the game works and relaying it in this guide. Who cares what the precise damage falloff of a gun is? If I gave you the exact equation to calculate damage falloff, would that be more or less useful than me saying "Hey, keep this gun under 50 meters"? I'm a pragmatist. This isn't rocket science or some MOBA where you have to min/max everything.

PLAY THE TUTORIAL. Seriously. Nobody plays the tutorial, but this game really needs you to play it. Everything in it will be covered here, but you should *still* play it.

Bandages don't heal immediately: they heal very slowly, which is why you can carry so many. You're intended to use a ton of them at once to give yourself continual and gradual healing. First aid shots take somewhat longer to use, but will quickly restore your health to maximum.

Plates are tricky. They work more or less like shields in Halo: get hit, lose armor plates, go to cover. You have to manually insert plates by reaching to the right side of your chest, grabbing the plate from the hotbar, and pushing it into your carrier by swiping left across your body. This gets you a lot of health fast, far faster than bandages or first aid shots. You can (need to, more on that later) expand this with a pickup for armor plate extension. These are found in the world randomly, in loot crates, and can be bought at purple vendors. (I will be referring to vendors by color through this guide. No one asks where the prime vendor is, they ask for the purple vendor.) Lastly, plates can be stacked in your inventory. Want to (theoretically) tank a ton of damage in CQB? Load up on a few stacks of plates and run with it. Want to keep your load light, which lets you run faster and longer? Go with fewer plates.

Ammunition is offered up in surprisingly high quantities. Don't load yourself down with too much: your risk of running out of ammo is far lower than you think. Time to kill is very low in this game, and provided you're landing your shots, you'll need one to two mags at most with really any weapon aside from pistols to kill a player with base health and armor. One stack for secondary, two for primary. Any more is putting you at a disadvantage, even with low-stacking ammo like sniper rounds. When reloading, don't throw away your mag unless it's empty! You won't be refunded that ammo unless you drop it into your pouch. This does not make your reloads any slower, and should be common practice with one exception: AK/AK Alpha allow you to kick the empty magazine out with a new mag, just like the real thing. This is beneficial as there is no magazine release function like ARs and pistols.

Speaking of ammo and consumables, the throwables in this game are second to none. They may seem more or less gimmicky, but they're absolutely not. Pick them up and use them. To select a grenade, use the hotbar on your left chest area. It's in the same place as your healing items, just mirrored to your left, and works the same way. There are lots of grenades in this: Frags, which need no introduction: throw and get a boom after 5 seconds. Detection grenades will mark enemies in its radius for a few seconds after detonation. These marks work for you and your team. The enemy will be notified that they were detected, but not by who or from where. Flashbang grenades work like any other game: you throw, and after a short fuse they explode and blind/deafen enemies. I rarely ever see these used, I have never been flashed, I have never flashed anyone. Radiation grenades are a storm in your pocket: throw it, and it creates a damaging cloud for a few seconds. This will not be absorbed by plates: it goes right to the enemies' health bar. Smoke grenades create a sizable greenish smoke cloud after their fuse expires.

Money. You need it, you want it, you will kill others for it and take it. Money is an extremely valuable resource in C:S, do not underestimate its importance. This is not some convenient side mechanic: money is absolutely critical to your success, and being broke will ensure your downfall late into the match. Cash will allow you to buy weapons, ammo, attachments, expansions, plates, healing items, revives, insurance, M.I.C.A. chips, and probably some other things I'm missing. In short, if you're in a rush and you can pick between grabbing plates or grabbing cash: grab the cash unless you're totally out of plates. The value of cash cannot be overstated.

Revives and insurance can be bought at the blue vendors. Revives, as you may imagine, revive a dead player on your team. They will drop in with a pistol and some rounds, so if you're reviving them it helps everyone to have a weapon and some ammo for them. From being revived and watching other revived players, the revived player will drop in from a close area around the vendor, maybe in a circle of 100 meters. This is great, because it means whoever bought the revive is ideally going to have some help in a short amount of time after buying the revive. Insurance is a (kind of) prophylactic revive: you will drop in with a weapon and some rounds after death. There are two kinds of insurance, and unless you're legitimately unable to buy the second kind, there is no reason to buy the first. Basic insurance gets you an M9 pistol, does *not* last to the end of the game, and will disappear after a certain point toward the end of the game. I've heard round 5, i've heard 20 players, i cannot positively confirm either way. That being said: it doesn't matter. Buy advanced insurance. It lasts to the end of the game, and you get an AK with sidearm and rounds for both. It's twice as expensive, but the value is far more. You're not going to be a burden when you drop in, you're going to be combat effective instantly. Your teammates will thank you.

C:S has a very generous movement system: you are able to walk, run, and sprint along with a slide mechanic and parachuting. Walking is the default speed, running is a single click on the move stick, double click makes it a sprint. To slide down any incline (and potentially avoid fall damage!), flick the right stick down to crouch while moving. you can also do a short slide while running, but not up an incline. Parachuting is the last movement mechanic, and this is how you should be traversing long runs and getting away from the storm. After your initial drop, you can parachute either by running off a high cliff, throwing yourself off a zipline, or using vertical ziplines called redeploy stations. Redeploy stations are marked on your map/hud with an upwards arrow. These are by far the most useful way to parachute. Parachutes can speed up by pushing your hands forward, and slowed almost to a stop/loiter by pulling back. If you try to grab a weapon at any point, or place a map marker, you will drop the chute and fall.

Yes, that last bit was long. This will be (a little) better.

Parachuting on your first drop is absolutely vital, obviously.
>Don't be the guy who drops 500m away from everyone else and is rendered useless.
>Don't be the guy who hot-drops as a noob.
>Don't be the guy who is a skilled sweat that can fend for himself, but got teamed up with noobs and hot drops anyway.
>Don't be the guy who hangs in the air for the entire early game: steer yourself above your drop zone, or close enough, then fall. You can summon your chute again, and after about a second, your fall damage is zero or close enough to zero that it doesn't make any difference. TL;DR: Don't be a helicopter! Be a drop trooper.
>Don't be the guy who lags behind the entire team because he didn't want to use a redeploy, or thought it would be faster/safer to go on foot. It isn't faster, it isn't safer unless you're actively being fired on, and you gain nothing by foot travel

>Do be the guy who uses his parachute often: it's a tool with unlimited uses, which is very hard to come by in C:S.
>Do be the guy who scouts using redeploy stations: flying up and marking enemy positions, prospective looting zones, vantage points, and any point of interest is amazingly helpful to you and everyone on your team.
>Do be the guy who uses parachutes to drop in on enemies. If your team can hold down fire on a position and you have a redeploy or cliff to jump off, dropping in on enemies is extremely effective especially when coupled with grenades.
>Do understand that while parachuting gives you no health or armor benefits, it makes you almost impossible to hit due to speed and direction, which makes this extremely safe and effective for traversing wide expanses or hot areas.

Healing items are important, but don't use them as your first pick: plates are way faster to slot in and take effect instantly. I've been shot and killed so many times trying to heal that I lost count, but my survivability increased greatly once I switched to shoving more plates in my carrier instead. Get through the fight with plates, then heal when you're safe.

Stim packs are something you should use as soon as you find it. It makes you run faster, and it's kind of just a nice "gimme". Tactically, you could hold onto them until you needed to make a quick getaway, but you should really be posturing yourself in such a way that you don't need to do this.

Grenades don't work normally in this game. Frags don't usually kill, although they certainly can. It's far better to use a radiation grenade for area denial, detection grenades to mark enemies and allow you and your team to engage, or smoke to cover a push. Flashbangs, as mentioned, rarely get used but theoretically would be good in a push if you have them.

Slide down hills. Every hill you find, slide down it. It's faster and makes you shorter, so you're both faster and harder to hit. Because it's a hill, you obviously don't have cover, so getting through it as fast as possible is ideal.

Hardscoping is not recommended. Your ADS is determined solely by how fast you, the player, are able to bring up your weapon. Unless you're engaging at extreme distances, you're going to get peeked easily. Will it work if you're using real sniping tactics like staying inside a room, moving between shots, and coordinating fire with your team? Yes. But no one does that.

Please talk with your team. Even if it's one way and you're the only one talking, if you're doing callouts and talking, I promise you the other guys are either listening or trying their best to listen. Communication is so important in this game that it's almost in bad form to not at least make an attempt at it. And, because of how the Quest 2/3 is set up (what most people are playing this on), you don't even have to do anything. Your mic is always on., and I want to hear what you have to say.

Loot is randomized: one place might have great loot one time, and mid-to-meh loot next time. You just don't know until you drop or move on it.

Next up, weapons. There are a moderate selection of weapons in C:S, which all do different things.

Rifles:
>RC416: This is an excellent rifle. Reasonably high fire rate, fast reloads facilitated by a magazine release, a wide array of attachment capability, and high capacity make this an outstanding choice for any player. It doesn't excel at anything really, but it is very competent in all situations. Pair this weapon with any attachments you find, and ideally a 4x+dot optic. The irons are usable, barely.

>AK: Very basic AKM platform rifle. Same capacity as RC416, slower fire rate, same accuracy, but better damage. Does not accept the same amount of attachments: this rifle only takes optics and muzzle devices. Best paired with 4x+dot, or reflex optic. Irons are utter trash, true to life.

>XM5: Integrally suppressed, with similar fire rate to AK. I don't have much experience with this weapon because it's basically confined to weapon crates only, I've never once picked one up off the ground/table. This is best paired with a 4x+dot (notice the trend?), or 8x scope. Treat it like a sniper rifle just under the M1A if you find it.

>AK Alpha: This is an AK that takes RC416's array of attachments. Treat it like an AK.

For all of these rifles, I'm sure you noticed the optics trend: 4x+dot. The 4x+dot is the best optic for these weapons, bar none. You are able to pick off enemies at a distance with single fire and the ACOG, while in CQB or moderate range you're not forced to use a magnified optic or use the classic "cope tilt" maneuver. These are rifles: all of these except the AK are issued with magnified optics IRL, there is *zero* reason for you suffer through 50-75m engagements with irons. It's painful at best and a waste of ammo at worst. 4x+dot gives you the best chance of on-target effectiveness at range and versatility in close quarters.

SMGs:
Before I get into the weapons themselves, there's something to note: the SMG is the weapon of total noobs, total sweats, and total desperation. No normal people actually *want* these weapons, with the exception of the Evo. SMGs are the gun you have, not the gun you want, unless you're running it as a secondary (which is an excellent choice for sniper/DMR players like myself).

>Evo: an outstanding pick for CQB and low-medium range engagements, the blisteringly high fire rate and controllability make this weapon ideal for close quarters. If you really have to, you can put this in single fire and plink away at distance to whittle away health/plates. Don't expect a fast drop, however, it can absolutely be done. I speak as someone who has been on the receiving end of this many times. Best paired with a reflex optic or (guess who) 4x+dot. Irons are serviceable.

>Fury V: Cringe stick. Fires so quickly that it's just a bullet hose. CQB? great. Any other distance outside a room? Misery incarnate. I pass over this weapon to grab a pistol, unless I already have a pistol. To add insult to injury, there is no magazine release, you have to grab the mag every time you want to change it; which is really often because of its fire rate. Best paired with a reflex optic, which is basically a necessity, because the irons are jank garbage. There's no reason for it either, it's a picatinny rail, these sights could have been identical to the RC416's or XM5's. They *wanted* it to be like this.

>BX4: This is something of an oddity. It has a very high rate of fire, but it's also controllable like the Evo, and it reloads as easily as a pistol. However, for some reason, I cannot hit the broad side of a barn with irons and neither can anyone else I've played with. You basically have to "point shoot" this weapon. However, when paired with a 4x+dot or reflex, it's so accurate and retains so much velocity over distance (despite being 9mm IRL) that it can be used in place of a rifle. It's good, and I like it once I can put some kind of optic on it, it's just... weird.

Shotguns are easy: Flame 12 and S686. Neither of them need optics, but if you want to put a reflex on it, go ahead. S686 is basically a deletion stick inside a room: you have 2 shells that are a guaranteed down if you can keep both shells center mass. You need to double-tap your trigger and swing your support hand down after the first shot. This is slightly tricky, so practice it a little bit at the range, but once you have it down you're guaranteed a down or kill every single time. No questions asked, and even with a plate extension I'm pretty sure you'll get a down. With a headshot, absolutely guaranteed. Flame 12 is a spam stick: it's a semi auto magazine fed shotgun that is meant to be better than an SMG in extremely close quarters. If it were automatic, this would be universally true, however the semi auto nature of the weapon means that on-target effectiveness is decided solely by how fast you can mash the trigger and stay roughly on target. With a reflex sight, this is easy, and I've gotten a good amount of kills with the Flame 12. Outside of a room, though? Forget it.

Pistols are surprisingly varied for their class. Keep in mind that none of these are meant to be primaries, and can't really be used as such even in an emergency. If you're left with only a pistol, do not engage, because you're going to get smoked.

2011: This is my favorite. If I had to run a pistol for some reason, this would be *the* pistol. It's punchy for what it is, accurate with irons, has a reasonable 11 round capacity, accepts a decent amount of attachments, and it's so easy and fast to run that it makes for an ideal backup gun. Needs no optic, but works very well with a reflex.

G18c: Machine pistol. It burns through its extended magazine almost immediately. If you're inside a room, you'll get a good kill if you can keep it on target. This is a very big ask, however, because the extreme recoil makes it very difficult to use in full auto. Semi auto doesn't have enough punch to kill quickly, and is more of an annoyance or plate eater than anything. It's a mushy middle between the Fury V and M9, and I don't like it. Best paired with a reflex optic. And for God's sake, put a can or muzzle brake on this thing.

M9: The pistol of all time. MIddling capacity, attatchments, fire rate, accuracy and everything else. Irons are usable. I wouldn't bother using an optic.

Desert Eagle: Classic sniper pistol role. High power, higher recoil, low capacity. If you can tame its recoil, this is a great option for someone who likes SMGs, as it takes the same ammo but allows for longer range engagements. Pair this with a reflex sight, because the stock irons are inaccurate.

Snipers are my preferred weapon class. They're slightly underbalanced, but they afford great range and accuracy while also allowing for decent fire rate or the ability to knock out plates very quickly.

>M1A: My favorite primary. Good capacity, better power than a rifle, semi auto, and accurate. Best paired with a 4x+dot or 8x scope. Irons are surprisingly capable.

>M40A1: Bolt action, high power, mag fed. Serviceable irons, but really not the best for the ranges you'll want to use this at. Best paired with 8x scope.

>Kar98K: I don't like this gun. It's not really a good choice unless it's all you have, because the irons are so abysmal that it's almost impossible to get a shot at a moving target, and targets are always moving. It also never spawns near optics for some reason. If you can make it work, great. I don't bother. Good power and same capacity as the M40A1.

>Mk17: This is another good semi-auto pick, but it's confined to weapons chests as far as I've seen. Get it if you can. 4x+dot or 8x scope.

>RFB: Kel-tec's ♥♥♥♥♥-out space magic imbues you with great accuracy, range, and semi-auto power. Best paired with 4x+dot or 8x. Second favorite primary of mine.

>M200: Cheytac's Intervention makes its appearance in C:S with the highest power of any rifle. Airdrops and chests only.

I wasn't sure if this warranted its own section at first. The M.I.C.A, or PDA as I will refer to it because I'm too lazy to type M.I.C.A. for the entire guide, is basically just an extension of your HUD. That being said, C:S very intelligently bundled everything into it, which makes it more than just a minimap.

Your PDA is a general purpose I/O tool. What do I mean by that word salad? I mean that it's responsible for all your maps, your markers, planning your drops, bringing up your HUD (aside from team health info), using chips, decoding encrypted chips for rewards, and navigating vendor menus.

>Maps, markers, and waypoints
Your PDA allows you to view the map in two ways. If you grab it off your chest, it will automatically give you a small map. If you pull your trigger, it will display in large form. Both will disappear when you let go of your PDA, which cannot be lost or dropped.

The first thing you need to do when you spawn into the plane is bring up your PDA and put it in large form. You can effortlessly coordinate a drop plan with your team by looking over the map and placing your markers. The map will show the storm (blue), current safe circle (green), loot hotspots (orange solid circles), and a general layout of the game world. Early on, you should be memorizing this map, because you don't want to be slow to figuring out a drop zone when you spawn in.

Once you're in the field, your PDA will highlight any points of interest as a waypoint. Redeploy stations, vendors, and loot crates (within proximity) will all be shown. You, your team, and any markers placed will all be persistent and show constantly until removed or killed. To place a marker, pick up your PDA and point it like a flashlight in reverse grip: point the base of the PDA to your target and pull the trigger. You can also bring your hand up to your head and hold the trigger to show a preview, and release to place a marker. This is generally much faster.

>Chips

If you find any kind of chip in your travels, put it in your PDA. These chips vary from attack chips (ACs), passive chips (PCs), and encrypted chips (ECs). Attack chips are things like airstrikes and passive cover, that are actively placed and used. To use them. pick up your PDA and press one of the face buttons on your controller, B on Quest 2. This will allow you to select your chip, and use trigger to place/call in. Passive chips are things like detection jammers, which do not actively need to be used and will do their job independently. Encrypted chips are loot items that are picked up, decrypted over time in the field, and sent back to your home oil rig to be turned into useful things. All of these chips should be picked up whenever they're found! There's no reason to let one lay on the ground, unless it's going to take up a chip slot in use. If you overwrite a chip, it's gone. Check the icon on the chip and on your PDA: if it uses the same orange triangles in the icon, it will overwrite and you will lose the ability. Sometimes that's a good thing, sometimes not. If you have an EC decoding, and you slot in a new one, the old EC will drop to the ground and stop decoding. Generally, it's best to just let it decode, unless you're in a rush or you're decoding a grey (common) chip. ECs come in rarities: Grey for common, green for rare, and blue for unique. Grey chips will usually give you timed contracts or currency/XP, green will rarely give sprays/skins/charms but more commonly contracts and XP/currency, and blue chips are almost always going to give you something nice for a cosmetic. Once decoded, you don't even have to win the round: it's sent back to home base for you to use!

Attachments are kind of weird. You find attachments in the field, but the moment you clip them to your gun, they will change to be whatever you selected in the armory screen. For example: If you unlock a new angled grip, but you don't change it in the armory screen, you won't ever find it in the world: you need to manually change it in the armory on a gun-by-gun basis. This is tedious, but required to boost your stats. Yes, these are not solely cosmetic, these offer very specific in-field benefits to attributes like velocity, damage, headshot modifiers, recoil, vertical/horizontal motion, and more. It can also change the function of optics, like how someone decided it would be cool to make a tiny little half-moon magnified portion on a 4x+dot optic and make a huge reflex portion.

Needless to say, I threw that gun away instantly after stealing the mag from it.

You can unlock attachments from green and blue chips, or you can purchase them with coins from the shop. Coins are accrued from all chips in varying quantities.

I'm not going to list every iteration of attachments, because not only are they subject to change, there's a massive amount of them even in this early state and I have barely scratched the surface of what they can do. Same for cosmetics: just start unlocking them and find out what works for you.

I hope this has been at least somewhat helpful. I'm still very much a noob, but I'm a noob who does his research and pays attention to how things work. Unless something radical changes, most of this should hold true for the life of the game.

Get in the game, have some fun, shoot some cool guns, talk to some cool people. Mostly talk to some cool people. Please use your mic.

Best of luck,
-Crispy