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8 essential tips for playing Red Dead Online
The new online mode from Rockstar Games is a rootin’ tootin’ dip into the lawlessness of the Old West, so here are some tips to help you navigate the American frontier and create the perfect cowboy.
Red Dead Online is upon us, and while it’s still in a beta phase where canned beans are more valuable than wedding rings, it’s also a shotgun blast of inexplicable chaos. Its economy could use some fine tuning, but to all intents and purposes, RDO introduces one of the few environments in which you can rob a train, chug moonshine, name a horse after a Neon Genesis Evangelion character and intercept a mail delivery to crush Hideo Kojima’s dreams of assembling a modern day version of Kevin Costner’s The Postman. It still needs to add ponchos to the mix and reintroduce Red Dead Redemption’s ‘standoffs’, but here are a few crucial tips to help you navigate the American frontier and do so without being griefed into submission.
Create the perfect cowboy
There’s a good chance you’ll spend close to an hour with Red Dead Online’s character creator and we recommend you use every second you can and take your time. It gives players access to customisation like facial hair, scars, and makeup, and all of the above will cost you more than a pretty penny once you’re out in the online world. The same goes for your starting outfit, so make sure to equip clothing that’s attached to higher ranks. Items like boots and overalls can be swapped or stored at your Camp after the tutorial section.
There’s Ask Jeeves and then there’s Horley
© Rockstar Games
Fast travel via menus
Higher ranks can stick a Fast Travel Post in your Camp, but if you’re just starting out and tired of spending your life savings on a stagecoach from Tumbleweed to Saint Denis, then the game’s Free Roam: Area function is for you. Bringing up the standard menu while playing or before provides the option to Free Roam in a selected area, such as Ambarino, Lemoyne, New Austin or West Elizabeth. The function will load you into a random spot that’s in a new instance of Red Dead Online, but it’s a free means of travel and one that tips the sombrero to outlaws who grief.
He’s adorable but also worth the dinero to help you hunt
© Rockstar Games
Use hunting to earn money
Robbing bystanders, looting bodies, stealing horses and participating in PvP matches will only get you a few dollars, but the payoffs that come with hunting and fishing have largely stayed the same. Good and perfect pelts can net you upwards of $10 each and you can turn an ordinary stroll through Tall Trees into an 1899 ‘Cash For Gold’ infomercial with your horse’s inventory. You won’t unlock the bow until you hit Rank 10, so you may need to be a bit more resourceful when starting out. It’s Online, so just remember to sell your pelts at the Butcher (not the Trapper).
For when all hell breaks loose
© Rockstar Games
Stock up on ammo
Due to RDO’s 'country club' economy, ammo is scarce – especially as some PvP sessions will use your loadout and ammo reserves from Free Roam. Our solution is to buy, buy, buy. Ammo can be purchased via the pre-game lobby menu in PvP and via your catalogue in Free Roam (Left on D-Pad). You’re limited to a standard carrying capacity, so extra ammunition will need to be collected from the Post Office or your Camp’s Lockbox, but a few additional rounds will make sure you’re always prepared for the next gunfight. Unless it’s a knives-only affair, of course.
Invest in ability cards
Red Dead Online’s Ability Cards are essentially perk cards which produce effects and buff Dead Eye, Combat, Recovery, and Defense. You get your first Ability Card for free during the tutorial mission and the next few can be bought for $50 each within the menu. Additional cards and slots are unlocked as you level up and gain XP. They range from the likes of Hunker Down (Rank 20), which decreases damage received while hiding behind cover and Hangman (Rank 48), which allows players to use their lasso to choke enemies.
A brush a day keeps the cliff falls away
© Rockstar Games
Invest in your trusty steed
Horse Insurance is a commodity you'll eventually receive during Online’s intro mission sequence and it lets your horse ‘automatically recover over time if it’s critically injured’. It’s a useful policy that prevents you from paying fees if your uninsured horse accidentally skips off a cliff or chases too many waterfalls. Other helpful tips include using the Online Options to lock your steed to you and your friends (and not ‘everyone’) and getting a horse brush via the handheld catalogue to level up your horse bonding as soon as possible.
It’s like talking a dog off a meat wagon
© Rockstar Games
Spare bandit leaders (or not)
The act of discovering and eventually wiping out an entire Bandit Camp with nothing but a lasso and a hunting knife leaves you with the choice of killing or sparing the Bandit Leader. Going with Option B not only boosts your honour, but the Leader will usually offer you a Treasure Map or a semi-valuable resource in return. You can also go with Option C which is spare the Bandit King, collect your reward, and hogtie him as you see fit. Just beware of predators as there’s nothing worse than plotting a dastardly scheme only to be jumped by a nearby cougar or alligator.
Because some trains need robbing
© Rockstar Games
Posse up with friends
Red Dead Online comes alive when you’re in a group because it welcomes a more intricate form of role-playing that’s not just limited to country grammar and matching outfits. Interacting with story missions and events as a posse transitions into custom group expeditions that involve hunting, fishing, taming horses and ‘inconspicuously’ robbing a train. And because of the world that is RDR2, it doesn’t stop there as a quick trip to a General Store can develop into seven players trying to take out a full-sized grizzly bear with their fists.
