Dominate the Market with your SR-8

Most teams on Team Survivor will put their snipers at Narrow and Market to pick over the long stretches. Whereas Narrow, requiring each scope on either side to keep his crosshair on a single spot (more so in the case of Fountain side…), yields more random outcomes to sniper duels, there are a few tricks to Market that will allow the more knowledgeable player generally to come out on top.

New Alley Spawn

At the beginning of the round, regardless of where you’re playing, you should be prepared for a rush. In the case of Market from New Alley side, the sniper should be wary of pushing up too close to the tents before confirming that there is no rush. If he makes that mistake he is likely to get annihilated by five opponents with no safe and quick exit out of Market. So keep yourself, at least at the beginning of the round, either at the balcony or just below the stairs to the balcony and check for a rush, and for a sniper who might be looking for an early round pick. If there is a rush, lob a nade and make an escape taking at most one or two peeks for a gay pick. Otherwise, you can either push up to the tents or play from the balcony.

If you decide to push up to tent (as pushing up is good preparation for rushing on your pick with a teammate who might be playing by the bridge) always check the right corner of Alley Timbers first for opposing snipers who might be trying to get fancy on their positioning. Then, you can play from a number of spots. I prefer to snipe through the narrowest crack I can see since any sniper who tries to peek from the back of Old Alley, or through the flowers is doomed by the easy shot I have on them and the bad shot they have on me. It’s also good for picking off gutsy autos who try to check Market with a few walljumps. You can also play crouched at the rightmost side just because nobody plays there and the opposing sniper is likely not to check immediately for that position.

Or, you can play from the balcony. The most common spot played is behind the flowers so that your head is barely poking out. So, often it is to your advantage to play standing up on the railing scoped in on the crack so that your the opposing sniper who will almost always check for the head-being-the-flowers should be auto-fucked by your (hopefully) decent reaction time. There is also the added advantage of being able, again, to pick automatics who might jump into timbers for a rush or to check Market for enemies. Otherwise, playing behind the flowers isn’t really a bad idea either since your head is so hard to see.

Or, if you’re really ballsy, and you have a pretty good idea the sniper you’re playing against passive, AND you know that an enemy automatic isn’t going to fly out of the corner into your face (you will probably know these things late into the game), you can push down the Timbers for a gay pick that a lot of snipers won’t attempt. Just have on your nikes if you miss, or a teammate behind you to watch your back (hopefully).

Once you get a pick at Timbers, a number of spots are likely to be open. Obviously, the guy watching timbers for the enemy is down, so that whoever is playing bridge on the other side will have to split his attention. This makes it approximately seventeen times easier to rush into Alley Timbers and Main Square Alley with your team (not that rushing Timbers against a sniper is particularly hard in the first place).

Patio/Old-Alley Spawn

If you have a good Old-Alley spawn (like, you’re the first guy who can get into the Timbers), you can try for a gay early-round pick from Timbers. Just peek through the railing for an enemy sniper. If, instead of the sniper you see a rush, run away. If your spawn was bad and you tried to go for the pick anyway, there is a small risk that the other team might be rushing into Market and they’re already on the tents mowing your butt down. If you’re quite sure that the rush won’t happen, you can usually get into Timbers for a gay pick regardless of your spawn. Just be aware that the enemy sniper might have crossed to the balcony if you have late spawn and play to the left; a shot at a guy into timbers who is too far to the right is pretty easy for anybody playing in balcony. Finally, if you find that going for the early pick keeps resulting in your death, a nice thing to do is just to jump up and down in Timbers at the beginning of the round to check out who is in Market and where they’re going.

Now, Timbers is probably the harder side to duel from, as usually you have one billion more spots to check for and the guy inside the Market has only, like, one. A good way to check for the spot the guy is playing in Market is to bait a shot off by jumping across the crack like a kangaroo while zoomed in (a nice spot to do this is back by the flower beds). You’ll see the guy if he’s playing anywhere on balcony or on the left side of the tents. And, if he shoots, you can get the jump on him by keeping your scope where you saw him, hoping that he peeks the same spot again, or by prefiring him if he doesn’t shoot and decides not to move (for some reason). If you don’t see the guy while you jump around, he’s probably pushed up looking down Timbers from the corner, a good opportunity simply to scope through the crack, and wait. The sniper might cross the crack, and you’ll know where he is. Or, the whole enemy team might cross the crack, and you’ll want to play by the back Patio hallway, try to get a pick, run away, and hope your team doesn’t die.

Or there’s a good chance (on public servers) nobody’s playing in Market anyway and you can just push down and rape everybody from the Market doorway while they wonder where they’re getting shot from (this won’t work in a match; it also won’t work against Chrillo).

If you don’t see anybody for a long time, or if you get a pick, a good idea is to rush randomly through Timbers into Market with your Super Team and get a jump on your opponent.

So that’s how I play Market (for the most part) with an SR-8. Notice that dueling with snipers doesn’t depend on aim more than it does on reaction time and positioning. Most players with just decent aim, if they’re smart, can duel the long stretches on any map since usually it just involves shooting still targets. The SR-8 can be used to overcome lots of other sticky situations! Stay tuned!

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