This guide gives info and tips about gamemodes, combat, battle servers, armor and weapons, and workshop stuff. There are lists of examples for certain creations and different types of armor. And there are suggestions and views (opinions) on how to make combat fun and balance things.
I recommend navigating the guide by the Guide Index instead of scrolling to jump across sections.

Brick Rigs isn't one of those games where all the building pieces are balanced with each other, or where there's prices or limits to stuff. Armor and weapons can have varying amounts of power, all the way up to the point where it can make a server go below 1 fps.
It's up to creators to decide the experiences and various standards between creations.
(where in the game's community it's desired of course)

- Core/Cored: Often means a fat brick of armor encompassing the whole interior of a vehicle.
(like a block of cheese)
- OP: Overpowered
- AP: Standard ammo type.
- HE: Explosive ammo type.
- HMG: Big automatic gun brick.
- LMG/SMG/MG: Small automatic gun brick.
- TK: Teamkill
- Server: Player lobby
- FPS: Frames per second
- Stack: Bricks clipped inside of each other
- Plate: A thin piece of armor used in hollow armor
- Launcher Brick: A special weapon brick that shoots missile projectiles, can be homing
- Brick Missile: A missile or rocket made from bricks such as fins and fuel tanks
- BRAF: Brick Rigs Armed Forces, the green team in battle and conquest
- DW: Desert Worms, the yellow team in battle and conquest
- Legacy: An older version of the game, from before 2021.
- Autocannon (relating to logic): A circuit that makes a series of guns stagger fire for higher RPM.
- Linkspam/Connection spam: Stacking bricks for more connection strength.

- Hull: The body of a vehicle. (Sometimes the fuselage of a plane is referred to as hull.)
- Turret ring: The lower/inner part of a turret.
- Turret cap: The upper/outer part of a turret.
- RPM: Rounds per minute
- MBT: Main Battle Tank
- PC: Personnel Carrier, can also mean IFV or APC.
- SPG: Self-Propelled Gun, i.e. artillery, tank destroyer, etc.
- SPAAG: Self-Propelled Anti-Air Gun, a light tank with a very high RPM gun
- MRAP: Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected Vehicle
- FPV: First-Person View
- UAV: Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (ex. drones)

Battle mode is an elimination mode. If you joined mid-round you have to wait.

Conquest mode is capture the flag. You can respawn after dying, either on your base, captured points, or teammates in vehicles.
(Don't spawn on aircraft without passenger seats)

Deathmatch is about killing enough of the enemy until you win. The spawns are like Conquest.
(Playing with military vehicles is not recommended because of camping the single editor.)

Don't immediately spawn the thing that's on first page. Stuff like 'jet op variant', a nuke truck, or a flying death ball can get you banned.
Being on first page doesn't mean it's balanced according to every server. Keep in mind kids play this game.
(And there's a good amount of chaotic sandbox servers every day to mess around in instead.)
See this guide for a list of creations that may be considered overpowered.

Don't immediately rush or bomb enemy spawn with aircraft. Stay low to the ground for a couple dozen seconds to wait for the enemy to spawn and position themselves. Many people find spawn-rushing aircraft annoying, as the round ends before either team gets to do anything, starting over and repeating forever.
(If you go up high right away, don't expect mercy from AA. Aircraft are also much better on Canyon or with whitelist.)

Always read a server's description. At least read it if you're waiting for round to end (not doing anything).
Some servers are chaotic, especially those that have a lack of rules, but sometimes those with rules can also be chaotic.

Don't shoot your teammates at all if you can help it.
Shooting an on-foot teammate with handheld weapons like a pistol doesn't damage them, but vehicles can receive damage from any source. Look for a red icon over the vehicle before you shoot, or check the map to see where your teammates are.

Big bombs are usually banned. It's just not fair on any map (but maybe canyon), and is only fine if everyone is okay with it. High stack bombs can teamkill and lag the server, even crashing it if it's high stack enough.

Don't teleport right behind people. In sandbox combat servers that allow teleporting, you're usually expected to spawn in a certain area or a reasonable distance away from others. By extension, don't just spam the respawn-on-location button.

Don't take items from bodies. This is way less obvious and usually not in descriptions, but there is a very good chance of being banned for it.
(it's very annoying respawning with all your stuff gone)

Auto-removal on shortest time is best for performance. There is never ever a reason to get out of your vehicle unless you're deleting it, so this won't affect gameplay aside from cleaning up unused vehicles/wreckages.
If you can't seem to turn it on, click on Infinite.
(you can edit game.ini to make it shorter than 30 seconds)

Workshop filter sometimes prevents troll vehicles being used, but workshop isn't well moderated and trolls could upload before rejoining.
The filter can also be annoying because creations that were spawned in a certain server, cannot update in that server until it restarts.


If you were crashed and you re-host, check the chat for spawn messages or messages from the one who crashed you. You can click on them to ban the person. If you don't know who it was or can't find a message, you could enable workshop filter to attempt at preventing another crash.

It's highly recommended to set a modest brick limit, as usually anything over 1000 can start making serious dents in performance.


Furthermore, you should use a vehicle limit of around two, to prevent people from spawning more vehicles without removing abandoned. Only use a vehicle limit if you have autoremoval.
(Getting out of your vehicle should cause it to despawn quickly with autoremoval, anyways.)

Lag affects suspension, aerodynamics, rockets/missiles, actuators, etc. Generally making the game unfun even if you don't care about performance. FPS affects physics.

Do not ever spawn something over 2000 bricks unless you're fine with low FPS.

Nukes (bombs that clear 50m radius or more usually referred to as nukes) can be laggy if the bomb stack is all in one spot. If you want to make a less-laggy nuke, split the stack into multiple stacks physically separate from eachother.


High-brick vehicles can rarely be more server-friendly than lower-brick vehicles (unless the debris is allowed to exist for too long), so setting a low brick limit is always a good idea regardless.
(One way to test for lag is by flinging the vehicle into the air with something like a hex edited thruster, or into walls to test for destruction lag)

Vehicles with high stacked bricks (of any kind) can be laggy even if low brick.
For example, high armor stack can cause passive lag even if not destroyed. Gun stacks over 50 can easily make a server's FPS below 10 if destroyed.

If you're planning to host a whitelist server, be aware that a if you quit the game. Don't create whitelists that are too big or complex.
(If you know how to edit game.ini, you can backup the file. In 1.8 this bug was fixed.)

Large player count servers (ex. over 16) are usually laggy and chaotic, even if moderated. But it can be fun, probably not for everyone.
Unless it's whitelisted. (but it can still be laggy)

Don't assume the host is omnipotent. Always call out something bad if you see it.

If you're calling out someone, always state the player name if you can. Describe the vehicle's name or look at least.

You can click on a vehicle spawn message to check it's workshop page if it has one, to use the vehicle yourself or check if it's overpowered.
As you can see, this will also let you ban people quickly if you're the admin.

If you're in free-cam, always check under the map occasionally to see if anyone is down there.

Definitely doesn't apply to every existing server, this is just an example to help avoid bans if you don't want to read a server's description.

No overpowered vehicles (see this guide for list of examples that may be considered OP)
No unmanned vehicles (ex. no drones / fpv drones / kamikaze drones)
No unrealistic flying vehicles (ex. no oxima, no flying car. drones can also mean this)
No nukes (big bombs)
No spawnkilling
No teamkilling is usually common sense, but can sometimes be permitted against rule-breakers or as self-defense against other teamkillers
No cored vehicles (vehicles with a giant block of tungsten/steel covering the whole interior hull)

Glass cored vehicles, such as certain MRAPs, sometimes count as being against the rule of no cored vehicles. Yes, glass core armor is a thing.
Some servers have a rule against homing missile launcher bricks.
Sometimes brick-made missiles aren't allowed.
Sometimes a server will discourage or won't allow looking at the map for enemies.

There are different balances on the workshop. For example, a replica tank may represent 140mm cannon with 20 cannons, and another may represent the same caliber with 30 cannons.

https://steamhost.cn/steamcommunity_com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3480666636
This guide is about workshop creations. It has info on certain workshop items that are laggy and may be considered overpowered.
It also talks about the different trending standards for a creation's power, and typical designs associated with them. It shows armor layouts and weakspots of certain vehicles as well.

Lighter vehicles such as SPGs, SPAAGS, or PCs usually do not have strong front armor, and don't have strong armor in general. However, some creations representing these types of vehicles have strong armor. Some examples are in this guide.
These kinds of vehicles are not necessarily overpowered in every instance, just keep in mind some servers may not allow them.

Some tanks or MBTs have notable weaknesses, such as the driver's hatch or underside front plate. Replica tanks often have it, but not all authors do this.
Most tanks also keep shooting when ammo is blown out, even replica tanks, so don't count on it.

If a very large explosion occurs where a car or truck was, there is a slight possibility it was from the car or truck.

Always try shooting the sides of a tank where driver is, or where there's ammo or weakpoints. Some tanks have weakspots in front armor.

Always shoot fences when you can to get past them. Fences will break bricks if you run into them, and those bricks can clip inside and kill your vehicle when driving past.
(You can still drive through fences, they don't physically block you.)

Whenever a bunch of parts fly off your vehicle, it doesn't mean you're destroyed. If the gun still works and you can move you're fine.
(Try not to drive over big loose bricks, like tank wheels. They clip into your driver easier.)

Camera Move
While normally your camera will orbit around your vehicle, you can lock your camera's position relative to yourself and look around from that spot by holding right click.
(This is called Camera Move and you can rebind it.)
This is handy to peek around corners, periscope over Bricksville to spot threats, or interact with special nodes like Garages. That way, you can enter a garage from a much farther distance than normally.


It's not wise to stay in your scope/vehicle camera view at all times as you can severely limit your awareness of your surroundings and will probably find yourself getting ambushed. Stay in third person until you need to aim.
(unless the server doesn't allow it, which is probably very rare)


If you look at another vehicle, you'll see a green or red car icon over them indicating their team status. However, at a distance this won't appear. To prevent friendly fire incidents, check the locations of your teammates via the map (M) and cross-reference it with your target.


Vehicle disabled? Don't jump out just yet! See if you can use the Camera Move tip in this section to hop into a different vehicle first, either to commandeer it yourself, escape with an ally, or simply trick the enemy to give yourself precious time to run and hide.

It's good practice to recycle, even on a battlefield. Using the camera trick, you can delete unattended vehicles as you pass by them. Not only will this improve the server's performance, but it'll prevent loose bricks from clipping into your vehicle and killing you.

It was already mentioned that friends are marked on your map in green, and it's obvious that enemies are not marked at all. A somewhat-known fact, however, is that the map is a live aerial video feed, and if you look hard enough, you may be able to see enemy vehicles depending on their movement and profile.
(Some servers don't allow this or discourage it but they're rare.)


Launcher bricks do not explode when shot, but some creations use brick-made missiles that do explode when shot. If they do, you'll know about it.

Infantry combat in battle mode sucks. Unless there's a whitelist catered to it, in which case it can be good.

You should usually use a sniper in battle modes. At least have a scope. If your aim isn't up to snuff yet, a rifle will do the job. Granted, both of these are for use against other infantry, not vehicles. Your best bet is to find a garage as fast as possible against vehicles.
(You can snipe, sometimes pistol some stuff like armored cars.)

Don't think using an RPG or grenades against vehicles is a valid option in battle mode, unless the server is made for it.
Vehicles have to be light armored by design to be harmed by RPG or grenades.

Pistols can blow up engines, heli engines, and explosives. They can be a nice clutch against missile carriers, disable a tank with a weak rear (rare), or kill that one legacy heli kids spawn sometimes.

For getting ammo, always try to spawn gun bricks from editor instead of actually buying ammo because it's way cheaper.
https://steamhost.cn/steamcommunity_com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3420941100
You can spawn on teammates. If you see a teammate about to spawn something you can wait to spawn on them. It is not advised to spawn on aircraft without at least one passenger. For obvious reasons.

You can give others money by letting them delete your creation.
This doesn't mean people will let you scrap the creation if they haven't said anything in chat. If people died in a vehicle, they usually want to come back to scrap it themselves.
So, always ask to delete someone's vehicle.

If there's a car nearby, you can use third person in it to peek over buildings

You can travel or escape faster by seat-hopping.
Throw the seat and then immediately get in it.



Sniper and RPG Rangefind and drop compensation
(ignore sprint walk)

You can usually check weapon stack by looking at the ammo slider at the bottom left of the HUD and firing.

(In the case of something firing two ammo types, or a handful of autocannons having different gun stacks for each firing set, this method of checking may not be accurate.)

Guns stack when firing in the same frame and place. The guns will fire one projectile that has higher damage, and penetration as well in the case of Standard (AP) ammo type.

Use remote control bricks on missiles, bombs, etc to have their positions sync in multiplayer.

Autocannons that fire faster than FPS have higher gun stack.

HE autocannons are not as powerful as AP autocannons, but they can be annoying because of blocking people's view and camera shake.
(And if it catches someone's vehicle on fire, the fire and smoke may block their view more)
HE cannons don't have a significant blast radius unless they are highly stacked.

Flamethrowers spawn slow-moving, short-lived particles in a wide spread that clip through bricks and damage everything in a one-meter radius. They can be used to effectively kill normal-sized vehicles at very very close range.

Incendiary ammo type is basically a weaker explosive bullet, because they both have the same chance to start fires for some reason.

Laser guided missile bricks' tracking is only based on the launcher's direction, it doesn't actually have a targeting laser.

Homing missiles have a tracking arc of 90 degrees and a range limit.

Projectiles have no drag
HE is round cannon, AP is square
this is from KoT, found through the game engine

Square cannons are stronger and have higher velocity than round cannons.

Launcher Brick missiles are 100m/s

RPM (Rounds per minute)
from Randomly Gamer

Projectile Sizes
- Cannon ~300mm
- HMG ~150mm
- LMG ~40mm
Setup of guns and block with holes used for size test

Amount of shots needed to take out a building for different guns.
made by ChockkyDragoness


Penetration Values
Penetration multiplies by gun stack count
Tungsten

How you can calculate penetration values for different materials:
Tungsten to Steel 1 HMG pen example
(I would test with gun just in case since these numbers are just approximations.)

Useful for testing penetration and damage
https://steamhost.cn/steamcommunity_com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3494452637
Blast Radius
Formulas that approximate blast radius based on liters.
(May not be accurate for liter count over 20k)
- Petrol: 1.18x^0.338
- Rocket: 2.48x^0.332
- Nitro: 2.61x^0.337
- C4: 2.85x^0.337

Tests missiles, bombs, rockets
https://steamhost.cn/steamcommunity_com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3495826508

Never put your seat on the turret itself. It can easily cause the vehicle's rotation and position to desync on other's ends.

There is not a health-based system for armor. It is connection strength and density based.
(You can see strength and density of materials for armor in the material menu.)

Density
Higher density materials are better at stopping penetration. Angling armor also helps a lot with stopping penetration, even 39mm armor can stop 30 cannon stack if stacked enough. There is also a simple ricochet mechanic. Tungsten is usually used because of it's high density and high connection strength. Gold isn't recommended for armor.

Connections
Bricks absorb more damage the more connections they have with other bricks.
Tungsten has the highest connection strength. Steel is second highest and also pretty good.

Damage Spread
Damage spread is dramatically reduced as it pierces a target. The first and second brick will receive a lot more damage compared to the third for example.

Seat protection is very good for preventing death by brick touching the driver. You can just cover the seat with a glass or wood shape.

Thinner parts of a shape are easier to penetrate.


Bullets penetrating a big block of a material will deviate more than a plate, and it depends on how hard it was for the bullets to penetrate.

- Tungsten is cheapest for both density and strength at small scaleable sizes
- Steel is cheaper for strength at large scaleable sizes
- Chrome is cheaper for density at large scaleable sizes
- Old wood is lighter, cheaper, and stronger than plastic.
- Foam is cheapest and lightest material but very weak.
- Gold has less connection strength, is much more expensive, and only bit more dense than tungsten.

Good armor has two main components, armor and connection spam. Armor is what's used to prevent penetration, and depends upon density of a material and angle. Connection spam will also prevent penetration at angles, but they're thin plates that are mainly used to keep a creation together upon damage.
(You can use armor as connection spam, especially in cored builds, it's just very laggy, heavy, and unnecessary.)

The best way to make armor is to add it incrementally and shoot it with a stacked gun you'd like to balance against, such as 10 cannon stack. Just eyeballing it may cause issues, but with experience it's okay to do.
Useful for testing armor
https://steamhost.cn/steamcommunity_com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3494452637
Always aim for simplicity with the armor design you use. Try to avoid stacking several dozen armor bricks in one spot when you can, and you don't need to connection spam every brick.
If it can't be simple, you might have to armor it against lower stack weapons, or make the armor bigger somehow (or go with a different armor design) to keep it low brick.

Try using various shapes like half cylinders for armor if you need an effective complex armor design.

Core in this case just means a fat brick of armor.

Warden
Hollow with front block core
Good for balancing and very simple, difficult to represent a lower plate weakness


Venka
Hollow with front connection spam
Good for balancing and having exterior front plates stay on
Not most efficient armor design, but good balance for high angle front plates


Leclerc
Hollow with angled front block core and layers
The angle improves absorption, and layers represent a weaker lower front plate


Maus op variant
Cored hull and turret (commonly 'op' armor)
Hard to balance, very heavy, very simple. Worse than hollow for explosives protection
(even if the big block isn't tungsten, penetrating bullets will deviate)


Hollow turret ring
Good for balancing ammo/crew in turret ring, simple


Low brick tank
Aluminum/steel cored turret
Not armored but not hollow, simple
Steel could be hard to balance for ammo or crew in turret cap, but aluminum is fine above ~3 cannon pen for normal sized tank turrets


Shakrask
Hollow turret
Good for balancing turret cap ammo or crew


Eskarol & M1A2
Angled plates and front cores complex
Good for balance and realism, keeps basically all exterior plates on, complicated
(The top armor design is more platey than core)



Here is a video guide for a certain turret armor type made by Litchytsu

https://steamhost.cn/steamcommunity_com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2144878965
Law of Adjacent Actuators
Actuators will collide with other actuators, and objects they're not attached to. Actuators will not collide with what they're attached to.
(ex. yaw part of turret will phase through hull, but pitch will not phase through hull, and the whole turret will not phase through another turret)

Look at this guide's Actuator section for more information on actuators.
https://steamhost.cn/steamcommunity_com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3171517313

This section is opinions and stuff about balance.

I suggest building with fun in mind and not just winning. Forming groups/agreements with others and maybe even making custom battle servers. Just being like friendly neighbors is good too I'd say. Isolation and competition will usually form toxicity, and it's not necessary in a video game made for fun. There's no scores, no ranks, no rewards or stakes. You don't have to strictly balance everything, it can just help a lot when used right. It's okay to use crazy stuff once in a while.

Sandbox battle servers with spawn points players must adhere to are usually better.

Sandbox infantry combat maps using pinned brick maps can be pretty fun too.

I think using the map should be just for checking teammates and seeing if the enemy is on hilltown or other distant camping spots. Third person is already pretty powerful, but not powerful enough to always see the enemy, so ambush tactics are valid.

Speed of a turret's rotation matters.

Vehicles with high fire-rate, brick missiles, or any one-shotting weapons with strong armor are usually not enjoyable to play against.
Fast moving or very small vehicles with strong armor can also be annoying.

Explosive FPV drones and missiles with cameras in them are usuallly considered extremely unfair. Sitting at spawn completely safe while spawnkilling with bombs that at most two-tap vehicles requires little skill and can produce a lot of annoyance. Even if you aren't spawnkilling, there is still one-shotting or disabling vehicles with little effort and high safety. The only threat to you is aircraft, and with AA you can just delete aircraft and go back to the usual since you're standing next to the garage.

Sky cameras (cameras on hex-edited piston poles which travel hundreds of meters into the air to give the user a bird's-eye-view) can be considered unfair or cheaty, but typically the actual fairness can depend on the use case, such as if the camera is decorated like a drone to be visible, or if the vehicle that uses it can't do a whole lot with the information.
For example, using mouse-guided missiles with a sky camera is largely considered unfair and the same as using camera missiles. However, artillery with sky camera is considered more fair.

Missile/rocket usage may not be enjoyable for some because of the destructive power with lack of aim, making it hard to respond to.

Homing launcher brick autocannon is generally annoying. It won't hit aircraft with flares, but it's like getting hit by an HE autocannon, across the map over buildings. Ground vehicles having flares doesn't matter much against homing missile spam.

Try to aim for a low stack armor and weapon balance with others. It's better for more creative designs, as it's easier and lower brick to armor things. It removes the need for giant blocks of armor or a lot of surface area for connection spam.
Just staying lower than 30 cannon stack helps a lot, but stuff like 20 or lower would be really nice.

Big bomb suicide cars (ex. blast radius of over 40m) are usually said to be annoying. They can be difficult to play against because of how the car doesn't actually need to be that close to get the kill, and big bomb suicide cars can easily teamkill by accident.

Fast moving or small vehicles usually shouldn't have strong front armor. And if you have a fast firing gun or missiles, consider making the armor weak on the turret at least, if not the front armor.

Hollow armor for hulls is really good for balancing. It allows for actuator-based logic that isn't adjacent to the hull to work as well. Cored hulls are the best for low brick armor against high penetration, but they are difficult to balance and are often considered unfair.
(If you're aiming for strong armor against explosives, hollow armor is lower brick.)

Consider making hollow armor for turrets that have ammo racks in them. Or other important things.

Putting ammo racks in your ground vehicles makes them a lot funner (and less difficult) to fight. Disabling mechanics such as not letting guns fire when ammo is blown out, or helicopters spinning out from a tail rotor being destroyed is also nice.

A good amount of tanks have driven road wheels because the tracks are a bit too weak for some. Some workshop PC or SPAAG calibers can destroy tracks in one shot for example. But with lower weapon stack standards, tracks could be seen as stronger.

I will consider crediting anyone I know who asks (possibly learned from).
Credited people can request for anyone specific to be credited.
You can ask for credit to be placed next to tips.
You can use information from this guide for your own guides.

Please suggest or correct information for this guide in the comments, and you can also be credited if you want.

Also please ask questions, and suggest stuff that may help with curse of knowledge bias stuff.

kirb
Litchytsu
Varisha
Randomly Gamer
KoT
hebus1360
grapyl
DEADLINERdeslain
Ookron
STRemontator
ChockkyDragoness