In Modern Warfare 2, playing stealthy is one of the major multiplayer strategies. The basic principle is not being seen or heard. Just as the principle of bluffing during a game of party poker is relatively simple, it can be much trickier to put it into practice. But, like bluffing, stealth play can be the key to overcoming your opponent. It’s not very hard to get started, but to excel in stealth play is pretty difficult. I’ll give you some tips to help you become the player that will surprise the enemy: “Where the @*$# did that guy come from?!”
Update: video added, see bottom of post
You all know how a stealth bomber looks right? I won’t go into the mechanics of the stealth technique behind that, but the principle is that they can’t be seen (by radar and other means). That same principle applies in MW2. We don’t want to be seen (or heard). Let’s start with the most essential part of not being seen: your custom class.
Custom Class
The following elements are pretty much mandatory to being stealthy:
- Equip your weapon with a silencer
- Use Cold-Blooded as 2nd perk
- Use Ninja as 3rd perk
Let me explain that briefly: the silencer is pretty obvious. It reduces muzzle flash making you less visible whilst shooting, it reduces sound so it’s harder to hear you and to hear where you are and you won’t show up on the radar. It also has some disadvantages: it takes up an attachment slot and it reduces short-range damage. How that works? Every weapon has a certain range of damage it can do. For example, on long range it might do 30 damage per bullet (out of 100 health), on short range it might do 40. Using a silencer makes your gun do 30 damage at much closer range than without silencer. On really short range, there’s no difference, and on long range it doesn’t matter as well. One exception is the sniper-rifle, which just gets a damage reduction on every range using a silencer (not recommended). Your secondary can be silenced, but you can choose for an unsilenced weapon to lure enemies to you.
Then we have Cold-Blooded. You won’t show up on enemy radar if they have UAV and you won’t be seen by enemy air support (so your less likely to get a nice little Predator Missile on you). The Pro version has a nice bonus: when an enemy is aiming at you, your name won’t show up (normally he’d see your name in red). Especially when wearing a sniper ghillie this can make a huge difference. In the map Rundown there’s lots of high grass, it will be a lot harder to spot you there with Cold-Blooded Pro.
Lastly we have Ninja. This perk hides you from Heartbeat Sensors (HBS), which is a good thing since you don’t want to be seen. The Pro version has an extremely useful bonus: silent footsteps. This works on two sides: 1. The enemy will have a hard time hearing you coming (footsteps are 1/4th of the original volume) and 2. you won’t be distracted by the sound of your own footsteps, enabling you to focus better on enemy sound. Note that when you walk through some bushes, it will still make sound. It’s just your footsteps that are quieter.
As for choosing a weapon, it greatly depends on the map and your playing style. Having said that, most of the times you’ll see stealth players using assault rifles or smg’s. The secondary depends on certain things as well. Do you want to be silent with your secondary too? In that case, don’t go with the shotgun! Shotgun + silencer = bad! It affects the (already low) range and spread. A good choice would be a silenced machine pistol or handgun (M9). Special grenade is up to you. Smoke is good for distraction and cover, stuns and flashes are nice to clear out buildings. As for equipment, I’d say there’s plenty of choice. Tactical insertion can be nice to avoid having to travel long distances after being killed, claymores are good to cover your back when needed and a semtex or frag is always nice to have.
Well, let’s get into some tactics to play stealthy!
Movement
You don’t want to be seen, so you’ve got to be very careful when moving around. Naturally, don’t go through the center unless you’re absolutely sure there’s nobody there. Instead, it’s a better idea to move around the edges of the map. That way, you’re travelling in the least busy areas and always have one side covered. Be very careful when going round corners or moving forward. Move from cover to cover and strafe (move sidewards) around corners, ready to face the enemy. Check all spots where enemies might hide and clear them out.
It’s also a good idea to move on your own instead of with your team. Look where you team is, predict where the enemies are and where they will be going and flank them! Just be patient; you’ll be running around a lot and it might take some time to get behind the enemies. Try to predict the enemies, think like them! If someone’s running away from you, where would he be going? Is there a way to cut him off?
Cover
Well I mentioned it already, use all possible cover! Watch closely where you take cover since some materials are better at stopping bullets than others. Concrete wall: good idea! Wooden house: bad idea! Also note the visibility behind cover. If they don’t see you, you don’t have to worry about bullets penetrating! So in you’re in the grass on Rundown and you’re prone, there’s no way that they’ll see you unless they walk over you. There’s also some places where it’s easier for you to see the enemies than for them to see you. These places require some experience and watching killcams to discover, but they are there.
Shooting
Try to isolate single enemies. Line up your sights and shoot! But be careful, only shoot when you know you can kill him. Shooting enemies does alert them. It doesn’t matter how invisible or quiet you are, once you start shooting they will see they get shot and they will know the direction. So if you shoot someone who’s just going round a corner, chances are you won’t kill him and you’ve given away your position. In the event that you encounter a group of enemies, facing their back, try to shoot the one most behind the first, so that the others won’t notice.
When an enemy has spotted you, it’s important to deal with it. Try to shoot him, use cover, move! He might give up on you and move along. If he doesn’t and it’s a direct confrontation, use everything needed to give yourself the advantage. For instance you could try dropshotting. This means going prone whilst shooting. You make yourself a smaller target that way. On Xbox and PS3 the only way to do this is to use the tactical button layout. You then use your knife-button. Another way to create an advantage for yourself is to throw a flash or stun, or distract him with a smoke grenade. You might even travel in an unlogical pattern to turn up on some place unexpected.
Other
Like I briefly mentioned, knowing team and enemy positions is very important. Therefore, it’s a good idea to use UAV. If you play with people you know, let a few of them use UAV as a killstreak. It definitely helps. Also press START or ESC once in a while to see the full map. Even without UAV, you’ll probably see some sort of area where people are shooting. If you see green arrows disappear, you know that there’s an enemy close to that position. Use that knowledge.
What helps a lot too is using your ears. Turn up that volume, use a headset. If you hear something, just sit and listen, try to determine direction. This is one of the reasons why it’s important to avoid the team (apart from turning yourself into a big target), cause you don’t need the distraction of friendly footsteps.
It’s also a good idea to look around carefully. Stop moving once in a while and look around for enemy movement. Get up nice and close to your screen to see in the distance. Doing this is very important and will most likely give you the advantage of knowing when and where enemies are coming.
So in the end, playing stealthy is moving around, not being seen or heard, picking off enemies one at a time, being away from the team and paying attention to all clues about enemy positions. Otherwise, it’s pretty straightforward. The hardest part is the part I can’t explain to you: trying to think like the enemy and predict them! But this might just be enough to get you started. Have fun!
I’m sure I missed some very important stealth things and I will update this when I find out. Please leave a comment if you have any suggestions.
And a short demonstration!
By popular demand, I shot a short video of some stealthy gameplay. Again, I don’t have a capture card so the best I can do at the moment is just point my old camera to my screen, I hope you’ll understand. So here it goes:
Let’s go over it briefly: the class I used is an ACR with silencer. Perks are Scavenger, Cold-Blooded Pro and Ninja Pro. At the start I get lucky since these guys jump right in front of me and I was expecting them (sound is very important to stealth), giving me two easy kills. You see I play very careful, taking lots of cover, especially when reloading. I try to stay away from the team as much as possible, trying to flank to opponents. So you see me moving by the edges of the map to the Domination flags that the enemy captured. Using a silencer and especially with the ACR (which does little damage per bullet) it’s important to see the enemy first and to aim dead on.
In the end, I think I did a pretty good job being stealthy. We didn’t win, perhaps partly because I did not focus to much on defending or taking over flags. So that’s one of the downsides; you can’t be full stealth all the time unless you’re playing with an organized team. And when the enemy sees you first or has a FAMAS, you’re screwed! Next time I would definitely capture the A flag, but it would mean giving up my position (they hear the guy saying someone’s taking over A) and thus not be full stealth. So for the purposes of this post I tried to be as stealthy as possible. Try it too! 
It’s also nice to use a higher damage weapon with silencer, especially if you don’t shoot long distance (I could have easily used the SCAR effectively). Or you could use a submachine gun and Marathon as blue perk. That’s more of a rushing set up, but you could be pretty stealthy.
[...] How to play stealthy [...]
Pingback by Some Modern Warfare 2 and Bad Company 2 … « Gamertag: xeer2000 — March 16, 2010 @ 11:17 am
Yeah man, that’s what I have been doing for few weeks now, after getting shot all the time because I was running into the ennemy bullets!
But there are levels you just can’t be too stealth, you gotta adapt.
Move quick, stop, aim and shoot, then move again, so that you don’t stay in the same place all the time, but still make sure you are covered….
Otherwise ennemy will come back and get you.
Your site is good, I am sure many people would get good info here.
I have been trying to snipe recently, got the thermal unlocked, but sometimes got bad games…
Got 23 kills to 1 death on Highrise yesterday, thanks to sniper and chopper gunner !!
Keep posting on different tactics, it’s very helpful!
Comment by Julian — March 17, 2010 @ 2:44 pm
Can you please make a video example, like you did with defensive play? Thanks.
Comment by X ninja X 93 — March 18, 2010 @ 5:11 pm
Yeah, I’m planning to do so, just have to find a little time. Otherwise I might add a video from somebody else or at least some pictures. So please check back in a few days, should be up within a week.
EDIT: Video added, I hope it’s useful!
Comment by MW2 Tactics.net — March 18, 2010 @ 6:57 pm
thanks really helped me alot
Comment by mitchell — March 19, 2010 @ 4:43 am
Great video! I’m quickly becoming a big fan of your site, and this guide lived up to the standards of the other material. Epic FAMAS ninja-killing near 3:30! I’ll try this out in the future. How do you think a silenced EBR would do with a good, decent range secondary like a PP2K or TMP would do? That’d be kinda fun: I love running silenced sniper.
Comment by Trevor — March 29, 2010 @ 11:40 pm
Thanks for your kind words!
I personally love silenced snipers too, but it’s a lot harder to get kills on regular game modes (core). On hardcore, I use silenced snipers all the time. In fact, I got a nuke on HC HQ with a silenced sniper and a Magnum. PP2000 or TMP would do fine as secondary as well. But I would only use a silenced sniper on hardcore. On regular core modes, I’d rather try a silenced FAL or other assault rifle. If you do manage to do well with a silenced sniper on core, respect
. I do better with a silenced FAL.
Comment by MW2 Tactics.net — March 30, 2010 @ 12:02 am
Email me sometime, i’d like to post a guide for a stealthy sniper. It just needs a video.
Comment by Omega8o8 — April 6, 2010 @ 9:42 am
Very good strategy but wat if u dont have ninja?
Comment by XxOwNAGExX — April 11, 2010 @ 12:11 am
use steady aim or comando but not scrambler because it tell people your close
Comment by alex — April 19, 2010 @ 3:42 am
I think it depends. To be totally stealth, in my opinion, you need to make every shot count. One some occasions though, it might be more beneficial to just try it and take the shot. But if you happen to miss or not kill, you’ve got to change tactics because someone is likely to know where you are. If you’re prepared, sometimes that’s indeed a better tactic. But if you need to be 100% stealth, I’d be very careful where I’m shooting at.
I can’t argue with your final argument, lol. It’s true, everything you don’t shoot at, you’re not going to kill. But when you’re stealthy, it’s not always about kills. It could be about k/d-ratio, or teamplay, etc. So it all depends on the situation. It’s a good thing you point it out though, it isn’t as black and white as it may seem.
Comment by MW2 Tactics.net — May 9, 2010 @ 1:25 am
great site all round, thanks bud – simple enough to remember, easy enough to use even if noobing. someone told me there are 99 kinds of lunacy but only 1 kind of common sense – that’s your site – keep it up!
Comment by Hi_Wind — June 21, 2010 @ 7:46 pm
Two things that should probably be mentioned:
Bling for your first perk to enable you to run a silenced weapon AND a heartbeat sensor. I know that there are many perks for the first tier that generally outweigh the advantage of a second attachment, but when you are running a full stealth build, the heartbeat sensor allows you to move about the edges of the map without fear of ambush (except in the rare case of someone else running ninja).
The other thing that bears mention is your choice of equipment and special grenades. You could, of course, run with the standard frags and flashbangs but I find smoke grenades to be an invaluable tool for turning exposure to the enemy into a perfect opportunity to manoeuvre to superior firing positions. And stealthed individuals have the best opportunities for delivering an offside claymore or C4 charge, not too mention the throwing knife kill, just cuz you can.
Comment by Dumptruck — June 28, 2010 @ 8:13 pm
hey tactics, our clan follows your tactics frequently, we were curious if you could meet up with us online and help us plan out some team tactics?
Comment by Auterson — July 16, 2010 @ 4:50 pm
I’m flatter you guys follow MW2 Tactics, but I don’t think I’ll be able to help you guys… Not that I don’t want to, but I’ve never played MW2 with a team. My friends don’t play MW2 or on another platform and I simple don’t have the time to join a clan. Having said that, feel free to contact me at info@mw2tactics.net if you have some more specific questions.
Comment by admin — July 18, 2010 @ 9:19 pm
That is a fantastic guide and from now on I am going to play stealthely. Thanks for the help.
Comment by Oliver — August 23, 2010 @ 9:22 am
thnx dude ur website is really helpful ill come to this for every type of class thnx man ur beast!!
Comment by tankedkilljoy31 — October 5, 2010 @ 10:11 pm
Thanks man, glad you like it! Tell your friends
Comment by admin — October 6, 2010 @ 2:18 am
cool helped alot i got another trick acting dead you will need cold blooded pro then just go into a game lie on the ground and keep taping triangle or Y and it will look like your dead enemys walk right past you
Comment by kieran — October 17, 2010 @ 10:40 pm
Good topic and video for the guys that play for ratios instead of game objectives.
As you pointed out yourself, your team lost that domination game partly because you simply did not go for the objective and have chosen to go for the l33t K/D ratio. Imo there is already too many players on publics that simply do not go for the objective and think they are an asset to the team simply because they have a 5/1 K/D ratio. As a matter of fact KD ratios are overrated in online gaming.
On the other hand this particular style of gaming is beneficial in for instance team deathmatch and in other gametypes your killstreaks might even help your teammates to achieve objectives more easy.
Showing this playing style in a tdm game would have been wiser…
Comment by objective player — November 30, 2010 @ 3:43 pm
Great keep up with these vids please they help me quite alot. I would like to ask you if have you ever had all attachments in all weapons.
Comment by MW24eva — December 24, 2010 @ 11:29 pm
So what i have as a stelth class for mw2 is FAMAS with silencer and acog scope (bling pro) and a USP45 handgun with silencer and tactical knife. i have a throwing knife for equipment (might change soon) and Smoke or stun for granade. perks are bling pro, other second one lots are usefull for stealth and commando pro for last. Hope this helps. oh ya and make sure to stay in the shadows or darker area/maps it helps because of the light. if there are enemies close by don’t even move just aim carefully and shoot. movement atracts attention and attention is bad.
LIVE LIFE LOUD
Comment by ryan — March 7, 2011 @ 12:44 am
i love attention, so i dont like being stealthy ^^ got 46-2 on favela today ^^ but i did NOT get nuke
((
Comment by kebab — March 21, 2011 @ 7:08 pm
I would recommend a TAR 21 with suppressor and heartbeat sensor.Perks: Bling (Pro), Cold Blooded (Pro), Ninja (Pro).A TAR 21 has a higher damage percentage and fire rate.As a secondary weapon, I use my Bling Pro to use a handgun other than a desert eagle or .44 magnum,mainly because they don’t accept silencers.Son,USP silenced,tactical knife, or M9 silenced, tactical knife.(I would also use the “playing dead strategy” when I am 1 or 2 kills short from a nuke.)
Wonderful strategy and good hunting;
Fellow “Ghost”.
Comment by BlackWing — April 13, 2011 @ 11:44 pm
you know there were boosters in that lobby right? at 0:59 you can hear their tactical insertions and see they r getting headshots
Comment by chad — April 18, 2011 @ 4:13 am
that was a maad video. when i go stealth i use M4A1 silencer & HBS. Perks Bling Pro, Cold Blooded Pro and Ninja Pro. I also use UMP45 silenced. Perks Marathon Pro Cold Blooded Pro and Ninja Pro
Comment by Jake — April 25, 2011 @ 6:23 am
Would an AK-47 work as a stealth weapon? Because I am stuck between on choosing an ACR or the AK-47. Also thanks for these very helpful tips. I hated getting hit markers all the time.
Comment by jlr777 — August 17, 2011 @ 4:16 pm
Sure, anything with a silencer will work for stealth I think. As long as you’re able to use it
I’ve had good luck with SMG’s without silencer as well, but key is to keep moving around like a mad men, so it’s very different. Anyway, go with the AK if you like that rifle!
Comment by admin — August 17, 2011 @ 6:56 pm
I have been using the m21 ebr silenced with fmj cold blooded pro and ninja pro with what ever camo helps with that map and i have been doing really good specially on afghan wasteland derail and underpass oopps i forgot estate also all becuase they are big well stealthy maps to play
Comment by stealthy macaroni — September 12, 2011 @ 1:44 am
Yea if u have ps3 add me so we can do some stealth matches my PSN is same as this name (NaRuToPK12
Comment by NaRuToPK12 — October 16, 2011 @ 9:11 pm
DO NOT USE THE M9 AS A SECONDARY!! Even if it is surpressed it will still show up on the map. What I do is go to a private match and silence strong weapons and then shoot them. Because even with a surpressor your weapon can still be heard. Take the M4A1, M16A4 and AK-47 for example. DO NOT USE BECAUSE THE SURPRESSOR MAKES THE ROUND LOUD. Use something like a UMP45 for a primary and then just a secondary like m93 raffica. But listen to the noise of the surpressor. Even if it’s silenced doesn’t mean it can’t be still heard.
Comment by Silverfang9293 — October 24, 2011 @ 7:11 pm
im good at mw2 but i go for nukes all the time and i get my harrirs then they dont do much then i try to get them my selfbut people kill me so i dont know
Comment by warren — April 7, 2012 @ 8:30 pm