Back 4 Blood Tips: Complete Beginner's Guide

Familiarizing oneself with these Back 4 Blood tips is vital for success in the co-op zombie shooter. Back 4 Blood may look simple on the outside, but this Left 4 Dead successor has a surprising amount of depth to it, so implementing these Back 4 Blood tips into your gameplay will tremendously boost your chances of success on the higher difficulties like Veteran and Nightmare.

• Read our Back 4 Blood review to learn our thoughts on the game and whether it's worth picking up

Back 4 Blood Tips: Know Your Playstyle

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In Left 4 Dead, character choice had no impact on gameplay. However, Back 4 Blood characters all come with their own unique perks and starter weapons. 

Each Back 4 Blood character's kit is designed around a specific playstyle. For example, Mom can instantly revive an incapacitated teammate once per level, has one additional Support inventory slot, and grants her team an extra life. Mom is obviously designed for players with a support/medic mentality.

Meanwhile, a character like Hoffman can carry an extra Offensive gadget like a grenade and is able to find and hold extra ammo. Hoffman is built for players with an aggressive slayer playstyle.

These character perks can alter Back 4 Blood gameplay in huge ways, so try to pick a character that aligns with your desired playstyle. The more compatible your playstyle is with your character’s kit, the bigger an impact you’ll have on the Cleaner team’s success.

Back 4 Blood Tips: Optimise Your Deck

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Doubling down on the player choice and customisation, a major feature of Back 4 Blood is its card deck building system. Players can build a deck of 15 special cards to take with them into any given level. These cards offer unique and interesting perks that alter and influence gameplay. Players can unlock new cards by spending Supply Points and progressing through Back 4 Blood Supply Lines.

Like the character perks, there are cards for all sorts of playstyles and situations. Like to fight your zombies up close and personal? Players can replace their fists with a combat knife for stronger melee attacks. Always running out of stamina? There are cards that will provide a boost to your total stamina levels.

It’s important to note that the order you place the cards in your deck matters. Cards at the top of the deck will be given to you earlier in a run, with the very top card being issued to the user right away.

Back 4 Blood cards offer an insane level of customisation, allowing players to tinker and tailor a card deck perfect for their desired playstyle.

Back 4 Blood Tips: Mash Melee

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Melee is an underrated tool of Back 4 Blood. The melee ability can turn an overwhelming situation completely around. Using melee on a horde of zombies will push them back, stunning them and opening a window for you or your team to finish them off with a barrage of bullets from the best Back 4 Blood weapons. Not to mention, using melee conserves ammo, a resource that can be limited in Back 4 Blood. 

The melee ability is perfect for eliminating weaker zombies or situations where you find your gun’s magazine empty and an army of undead is rushing you all at once.

Back 4 Blood Tips: Avoid Environmental Hazards

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Environmental Hazards are one of the key gameplay elements of Back 4 Blood. Triggering an Environmental Hazard can end a run with quickness on higher difficulty levels.

Flocks of birds and security alarms on doors and cars are a few examples of Environmental Hazards players will encounter in Back 4 Blood. Triggering any of these hazards will cause a horde of zombies to pour in, which can be extremely oppressive when paired with the zombies your team is already dealing with. These Environmental Hazards can be detrimental to your team’s success when triggered at an inconvenient time.

Always keep a lookout for Environmental Hazards and call them out or ping them for your allies when you come across one. One unaware Cleaner could spoil the whole team’s progress. It's worth noting that some players are speculating triggering multiple Environmental Hazards simultaneously - shooting a lot of different bird flocks at once, for example - will only trigger one horde of zombies, which may be worth attempting if you want to remove the hazards entirely.

Back 4 Blood Tips: Spend Copper Wisely

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Copper is the in-game currency Back 4 Blood players can use to purchase upgrades before each Campaign mission and at select points mid-mission. In the Safe House, players can spend Copper in exchange for gun upgrades, meds, pipe bombs, Molotovs, and much more. During a mission, players can spend Copper on medical cabinets and cards to add to their deck scattered around a level.

Copper is critical for gearing up before each mission. Players that don’t collect enough Copper may not be able to supply themselves with sufficient meds and grenades to make it through a level. Or worse, Copper poor players might not be able to afford to use that crucial medical cabinet mid-way through a mission.

Be frugal with your Copper and only spend it when necessary.

• Learn all about how to unlock characters in Back 4 Blood with our guide.

Back 4 Blood Tips: Coordinate With Your Team

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This last tip is probably the most important: coordinate with your team. Despite its image as a casual co-op zombie shooter, Back 4 Blood can be gruelling on the harder difficulty levels. On Nightmare and even Veteran difficulty, there is no room for error. To succeed, Back 4 Blood players must make a concerted effort to work with their team.

Share supplies and ammo with your teammates if they are low. Is one of your teammates in particular struggling? Use that med kit to keep them alive rather than selfishly holding it for yourself. Are your teammates low on Copper and you have an excess? Maybe buy them some of the supplies they need to carry on through the level.

In Back 4 Blood, zombies come from all angles. Have each teammate assigned to a different direction and work together to hold off the hordes. When a Special Ridden appears, call it out and instruct the team to shoot it all at once. Allowing Special Ridden to roam free can be ruinous to the squad, so take them down as fast as possible.

Working together as a team is of the utmost importance in Back 4 Blood.

Back 4 Blood is anything but a walk in the park — especially on the harder difficulties. Use these Back 4 Blood tips and tricks to ensure your success in the zombie-ridden world of Back 4 Blood.

Now you know all of our top Back 4 Blood tips, have a read of the best Back 4 Blood characters so you know who to pick.