Enemy Territory has five classes, each specialized for a specific purpose and vital to the war effort. Any class is capable of dealing with another in regular combat. Some may have certain advantages in some situations, but in general they are rather equivalent. What differentiates them are their special abilities.

Covert Ops

A spy and sniper in one. Can steal uniforms to disguise himself as the enemy, to use doors only accessible to the enemy or attack from behind. Satchel Charge (det pack) can be used to defuse dynamite very quickly, blow up command posts, machine gun emplacements and certain special objectives. Only class to not have either the MP40 or Thompson available to it; they have to settle for the Sten (a quiet and very accurate submachine gun prone to overheating), FG42 (a weapon thats inaccurate unless zoomed, holds only 20 rounds but fires so fast its one of the most deadly close-combat guns in the game) or K43 Sniper (the better of the two sniper rifles.)

Engineer

Absolutely necessary for every attack objective, and its hard to win on defense without him too. Can choose between the MP40/Thompson or the K43/Garand. The latter two can be used to fire rifle grenades (think: long range grenades with a short fuse timer), at a somewhat significant cost in the power bar. Most important abilities are laying anti-personnel mines, building structures, and setting dynamite to blow up objectives.

Field Ops

A support fire and ammunition supplies specialist. Can only have the MP40/Thompson, but comes equipped with binoculars with which he can call artillery strikes. Also throws airstrike markers and drops ammunition for fellows. Dont underestimate the need to make sure everyone has ammo.

Medic

Like the Field Ops, can only have the MP40/Thompson. Starts with less ammunition than any other class just one clip of ammo and one grenade. However, he can heal allies and himself with medkits, or revive them from near-death using adrenaline shots. Keep this in mind before you tap out with 30 seconds left on the timer.

Soldier

Has more weapon choices than anyone. MP40/Thompson, Panzerfaust, Mortar, mobile MG42, and flamethrower. The Panzerfaust, often considered a cheap weapon because you can all-but-guarantee youll get at least one kill before you die (often your attacker), is quite important nevertheless. Its balanced out by low ammo, a ~2 second warm up from the time you click shoot, and the fact that it can be fired only every so often, depending on your power bar. MG42 is another very useful weapon, often better at picking off distant targets than the sniper rifle. The flamethrower and mortar have their uses, but these are more limited. Any soldier spawning with a submachine gun is just wasting everyones time; hed be better off as one of the other classes.

The best servers to play on are between 20-26 players. 2, maybe 4 more or less wont kill you but may make cheap wins too common on small servers and there will be too much spam on larger ones for most peoples tastes.

Team damage being turned on is incredibly important, even on public servers. Otherwise panzer and air/artillery strike abuse will go completely unchecked. Having weapons restriction on to limit the use of those is even better, and is vital for actual competitive play.

Its worth noting that due to class and map imbalances, Enemy Territory isnt quite the perfect competitive game. Its best to play it like you would UT Assault mode, with teams alternating roles each round rather than sticking as Axis and Allied throughout the campaign.

Its also best to start off playing ET on the default 6 maps, though unfortunately the in-game server browser cant filter custom mods and maps out. In fact, this is one of those rare times when GameSpy Arcade is less painful than the default browser.

Campaigns

A campaign is a collection of maps played in sequence. Experience and abilities that the player gains in a class will continue through the campaign until it finishes. Enemy Territory has reached a great balance where it manages to make the experience rewards useful, without making players who joined in the middle of a campaign feel useless.

On public servers it really helps to simply fill the role that is missing on your team. If you dont see enough of one type of class, play it and enjoy the rewards your abilities will be rewarded more than they would be otherwise. If youre looking to achieve the highest rank possible, you need to maximize class abilities throughout the campaign. Play a medic on one map, soldier on the next, and so on.

The key to succeeding with your class and chosen weapon, after learning what its strengths and weaknesses are, is to know where hes most useful and to apply consistent pressure there. An engineer holding the Depot Yard on the Rail Gun map with mines can drive the other team batty and get a huge load of kills if he plays things right.

Manners

There is really only one rule that has to be maintained on an ET server dont camp spawn points or the only chokepoint out of an area. While theres nothing wrong with dropping artillery or mines on one of the two routes (either the broken wall or the caves) out of the Old City on Oasis, you shouldnt drop it right on their spawn or on both exits at the same time. Its just bad karma, liable to get you hated on that server and maybe even kicked or banned.