This guide is not meant to be a “best tactics” list nor the ultimate, definitive guide to tactical operations. The guide is meant to be a primer for further studies into or development of tactics in a simulated, digital environment.

The guide is heavily inspired by a variety of western law enforcement and military publications but the information has been modified to a significant degree to stay relevant to Ready or Not.

I have no practical experience in tactical operations outside the virtual domain; I am not law enforcement or military, former or current.

Fighting in a close quarters environment is among the most complex and difficult activities one can engage in as part of modern tactical operations within law enforcement due to the close proximity to your opponent, friendly elements, and civilians. To survive this high-risk environment, we need to understand the fundamentals of (virtual) close quarters battle.

Communication
CQB is a team activity, therefore, you need to communicate and coordinate within your entry team to achieve effect and prevent fratricide. You can luck your way to success, but being able to do so repeatedly requires that you pay attention to the fundamental principles.

Speed
Speed is not measured by how fast you move but how fast you can dominate and eliminate the threat in the objective. A team member should never move faster than he is capable of engaging threats and processing information.

Violence of Action
Violence of action can be summarized as maintaining an offensive posture and constant readiness to engage threats.

Surprise
Surprise is achieved through a combination of speed and violence of action. Be proactive in your actions and always attempt to gain an unfair advantage over your opponent.

There are two basic entry team organizations; unitary and split team. Note that neither organization is permanently binding and you may be forced to switch based on operational needs.

When organized as a unitary team, you will be working as a single unit. A unitary organization is the safest and most beginner friendly organization, though generally slower in terms of pace. The recommended unitary team layout can be seen below:


Scout
The eyes of the team; the scout uses his Optiwand to scan rooms ahead of the entry team and reports contacts (incl. civilians), room layout, openings, etc to the rest of the team. His primary task is to prepare the team for the next task. Typically also works with the Breacher to deploy throwables into rooms when called for. The scout enters as the second man as he will, by that time, have changed back to his primary weapon system.

Breacher
The breacher simply breaches locked doors, either through breaching shotgun, battering ram, or just picking the lock. The breacher has to work in close cooperation with the scout to properly deploy throwables through entrances. The breacher enters as the third man as he will, by that time, have changed back to his primary weapon system.

Shield Bearer
Carries the team’s ballistic shield and is always the first person to enter the structure being breached in order to provide cover for the remainder of the team to enter. The shield bearer enters first, because of obvious reasons.

Arrest Officer
The least appreciated but arguably the most important member of the team, the arrest officer secures evidence and contacts (incl. civilians) and reports to TOC. In addition, the Arrest Officer provides rear security. The arrest officer enters last as a “mopup” element to secure any civilians or suspects.

Team Leader
As the name suggests, the team leader directs the team towards completing assigned objectives. Not really a necessary role unless you’re operating as a 5-man team. Enters as the fourth man to issue follow-up commands and directives based on verbal reporting from the preceding personnel.

In a split-team organization, you have two 2-man teams (red and blue) and one 1-man command/reserve element (gold). If the red or blue team suffers a casualty, gold slots into that team at the earliest possible convenience.

Split team is more suitable for seasoned, more proficient players as it is a far more risky and vulnerable organization but has the benefit of being faster and more agile in terms of mobility.

There is no infallible organization or equipment layout for a split-team approach to an operation. Select your equipment in coordination with your team members and determine team belonging during the operational preplanning phase.

The most important part of operational preplanning is deciding what equipment to bring. Talk to your teammates and coordinate your choice of equipment with them. Redundancy is desirable for high-risk operations.

The planning phase starts as soon as the mission is selected. Take this opportunity to open your tablet ([TAB] by default) and study the briefing for insight into the situation and threat. Listen to the briefing, examine the suspects and civilians lists, look in the media tab for potential additional information.

If you decide to use the map to mark routes and such, I recommend being relatively vague in your plan as it will undoubtedly change during the course of the mission. Plan simple and only simple things can go wrong.

There are two possible methods of entry in Ready or Not.

The deliberate entry method emphasizes risk avoidance and stealth. It seeks to quietly close with and neutralize the threat. Deliberate entry quite simply is a slower and more methodical approach.

Dynamic entry is generally only used in active shooter scenarios where speed is prioritized over security. The dynamic method has a higher velocity than deliberate but comes with much higher risk.

There are four breaching methods possible in Ready or Not. Each method has its own advantages and disadvantages and none is perfect for every scenario. Your choice of breaching method will depend largely on your available equipment and chosen approach to completing the objectives.

Manual breaching is as simple as opening the door, or where required lockpicking it. It’s a quiet, stealthy approach but slow and time consuming.

Mechanical breaching involves the use of the battering ram to force doors open. Mechanical breaching can be considered a middle-ground between the manual and ballistic breaching methods.

Ballistic breaching uses the breaching shotgun to force doors open, either from close up or from a safe distance. The reason for using a ballistic breach instead of manual or mechanical is if the door is expected to have some kind of trap on it. Ballistic breaching can be done either on the door handle to force open the door slightly beyond what can be achieved by peeking it, or on the door hinges to break the door off the door frame. Both approaches will trigger any trap placed on the door, so be cautious. Ballistic breaching is very fast as you can be quite a distance away and still achieve good effect.

Explosive breaching uses a plastic explosive (C2) to blow the door open. This is a very dangerous but sometimes necessary approach to breaching a door. While it lets the entry team breach from cover, it will incapacitate or kill any suspect, or civilian, on the other side and therefore is not always ideal for some approaches. This does come with one key advantage which is a shock effect on the (unfortunate) inhabitants of the structure behind the door (provided it is sufficiently small).

There are three fundamental types of rooms. With the help of the Optiwand, you can identify what type of room you are entering, however this may not always be a viable option (e.g. active shooter scenarios).

A center-fed room is a room that has the entrance at least 3 meters from a perpendicular wall. Center-fed rooms in one-man entry operations are the most difficult type of rooms due to the many angles that you will be exposed to. Always assume a room is center-fed until the opposite has been proven.

A corner-fed room is a room where there runs a wall perpendicular to the one you are stacked up on and that is within 3 meters of the entrance.

In Ready or Not, all doors open away from the opener, making our lives significantly easier as we can always rely on the door to open in a particular manner. It is highly recommended to open doors from the handle side of the entrance rather than the hinge side, this is to reduce the angles you are exposed to upon opening the door.

A fatal funnel is any constricted area such as doorways, alleys, or hallways that will be the focal point of attention or anticipated avenue of advance. The fatal funnel is most likely to draw fire from anyone inside.

Note that you follow the walls closely to reduce the angles you are exposed to. Avoid standing in the middle of the room as this exposes you to the most amount of angles.

Cross is a movement to cross the fatal funnel and continue movement towards the opposite corner.

The hook movement is quite simply making a 180-degree turn during entry to end up in the near corner.

Limited entry is the safest but slowest method of making entry, it lets you get a better view into the room without having to commit to all angles yet. It gives you a time window to listen for noises inside the room and prepare yourself mentally for what lies ahead. It is followed by a cross or hook.

Slicing is a method that can be used during entry or when clearing corners, the goal of slicing is to reduce vulnerability by reducing the angles the operator is exposed to at any one time.

The small anchor in the center of the doorway is the position that you are fixated on during your slicing. Note that there is a threshold marked in the above animation. This is to prevent your weapon system colliding with the wall/door, as well as ensure ability to fire if a threat should suddenly exit the structure.

Note; slicing is not exclusive to doorways and is recommended when turning around corners in hostile environments.

I highly recommend binding “Toggle canted sight” (a.k.a “point shooting”) to an easily accessible key. Using point shooting is a very personal preference and situation dependent method. It is beneficial to use when clearing small rooms where the weapon system might otherwise cover a large portion of your field of view.

When the team is deployed using a ballistic shield, the shield bearer is always first into the room. It is crucial that the shield bearer overcome his instinct to stop when under fire. The shield bearer must push deep enough into the room to let his teammates enter behind him.

In the world of close quarters combat, mutual trust and confidence between team members can and will make a crucial difference in the operation and survival of the team at large. You need to trust your teammates to cover their sector, as they must trust you to do the same. The entry process will be hampered by a lack of trust between entry team members.

Furthermore, you will have your own sector in the room, and should not worry about the other sectors. Movement velocity is a big part of entry, and while you should not move faster than you can process information, once you cross the threshold, you cross the line of no return; you’re committed to the entry. Don’t stop inside the threshold to check all angles; trust your team members to cover the other sectors while you focus on your own.

Side-note: I have discovered a phenomenon I refer to as “collision fear” which is the hesitation of the next person to move in time to cover the person in front of them due to a fear of colliding with them or getting stuck in the doorway. In my subjective experience, this is far more fatal than words can describe. I recommend trying to overcome this by starting your movement as soon as the person ahead of you enters the 1.5 m threshold around the entry point. This should give you enough time to get moving without colliding.

In Ready or Not we have access to three throwable grenades; (1) Flashbang, (2) Stinger, (3) CS.

Flashbangs are intended to disorient a subject, but can also serve as distractionary devices. They do so via noise and light. While effective in confined spaces, their use diminishes in large areas.

Stinger grenades are intended to stun a subject by expelling several small rubber balls that cause immense pain but are reliant on being in direct view of the subject to actually impact the subject. Stingers are generally more reliable in open spaces, but perform poorly in confined spaces with large pieces of furniture.

CS a.k.a tear gas (or if you’re a chemistry nerd; 2-chlorobenzalmalononitrile) is a gas that seeks to incapacitate a subject by irritating the eyes and throat of the subject. Very effective in confined spaces, yet easily negated by gas masks.

I can’t give a single comprehensive infallible recommendation but I will say how I use the different throwables: (1) Flashbangs are used as an offensive weapon to throw deep into rooms occupied by potential suspects, (2) Stingers are used as a defensive weapon thrown shallow into rooms to stun known suspects on the other side, (3) CS is used as an incapacitating agent in unsure situations and deployed into the middle of the room where possible.

Rooms are dominated from the corners as this is from where you will have the best coverage of the enclosure. The point of domination is dictated by the location of entry point(s). Generally speaking all shots taken post-entry are taken while moving to this point of domination.

Note that assuming a point of domination is a prerequisite but not a guarantee of success and survival, never ignore anything that might conceal a person. Furthermore, avoid exposing yourself to adjoining rooms or spaces.

There is no best option applicable to every scenario and type of room, different room shapes and layouts will force you to move differently.

The most common endstate in room clearing is the opposing corner state. Communication and alertness is principally important. Team members execute entry and move themselves into opposite corners of the enclosure.
Additional personnel advance half of the path taken by preceding personnel but cover roughly the same area.

Strong wall technique seeks to dominate the room rapidly and force the opponent to make a decision on who to engage. The basic maneuvering is the same as Opposing Corners but the red man (in the above illustration) does not push into the deep corner.

Same-sided entry is generally done out of necessity rather than preference. Some rooms will have sub-rooms that, for whatever reason, we can not commit to or see into immediately. In such a case, the same side entry is acceptable to provide cover towards that sub-room. Keep in mind however that same side entry provides the opponent with twice as large of a target mass and therefore is especially vulnerable.

Disorganization with movement is a factor we need to account for and actively work towards preventing. Generally speaking, higher movement speeds become disorganized faster. Regardless of how experienced you are, you will always suffer disorganization with movement, the question is; to what extent? Training and experience can reduce, but not eliminate, this factor. Generally stacking up on a door in an orderly manner will reduce this factor significantly as you’ll have “gathered your forces” and can thereafter reconsolidate and reorganize.

Taking casualties is something we need to be prepared for even though we don’t want it to happen. I can’t give a detailed course of action for every casualty scenario, but I will just mention that the team needs to function even in the absence of any other role, down to the point of executing the mission alone. Naturally, not every member will be equipped for tackling the mission alone, which is where you need to rely on individual skill and proficiency to solve the assigned objectives.

Staircases can prove difficult for any team to tackle. Due to their inherent danger, at most two people should clear any one flight of stairs. There are two distinct versions of staircases in Ready Or Not; unexposed and exposed.

Unexposed staircases are the simplest to tackle and are characterized by having solid stairs and consequently no fear of getting shot in the back from above as you move up the staircase.

Exposed staircases are stairs where there is a possibility to get shot in the back from above the clearing party and pose a much bigger danger than capped stairs.

Ascending stairs are especially dangerous due to the threat posed from above the team, but this danger can be reduced by the following methods of ascension.

Diagonal Method
In the diagonal method, the team members are positioned in a diagonal line. One team member is positioned towards the center of the staircase while the other is positioned 45 degrees behind the first towards the outside of the staircase. The center man covers the next landing while the outer man covers either the balcony (exposed stairs) or assists in clearing the next landing (unexposed).

Back-to-Back
Back-to-back provides limited protection but can be the only possible method if the stairway is limited in width. Essentially this method has the first man cover up the stairs to the next landing, while the second man covers the balcony.

Clearing descending stairs is practically always easier than ascending stairs.

The first man positions himself towards the center of the stairs and covers down to the next landing. The second man proceeds down the staircase positioned to the outside of it. This way the center man has a clear field of fire down the staircase, while the second man moves down the stairs. Once the second man has reached the next landing, the roles swap around and so on, so forth.

It is ideal to deploy chemlights in doorways to best be seen, however in larger rooms with multiple points of entry, you may have to deploy the chemlight in some position visible from all entrances for reference in the secondary clearing sweep.

If a room is connected to other rooms that can only be accessed through one entrance, you need only deploy the chemlight in the first doorway.

Hopefully you found the guide useful and learned something new, or at least found it interesting. If there is anything you feel I have missed or gotten wrong, please do drop a comment below and I will answer at the earliest convenience.

Thanks.

You can do whatever you want with this guide, I really do not care.

Trivia: Version 2 was mostly written during a 7 hour delay in an airport terminal.