Capture the Flag
Capture the Flag is a Battleground where two teams each defend a flag and try to steal the other team's. It's part of the Battlegrounds system.
| Type | Battleground, flag capture |
|---|---|
| Teams | 2 |
| Objective | Capture the enemy flag |
| Special role | Flag carrier |
| Win condition | 3 captures |
| Match length | 15 minutes |
Overview
Each team guards a flag at its own base. To score, you have to fight your way into the enemy base, pick up their flag, and carry it all the way back to your own flag while it's still safely at home. The other team is doing the exact same thing to you, so a match usually turns into fights over both flags at once, with some players pushing to steal and others holding the line to defend.
How it works
- Picking up the flag. Walking onto the enemy flag while it's still at their base makes you the carrier. From that moment, everyone can see the flag is gone and where the fight is heading.
- Winning the match. The first team to reach 3 captures wins. If neither team gets there inside the 15 minutes, the side with more captures takes it.
- Scoring. You score by reaching your own flag while carrying the enemy's. If your own flag has been taken, you can't score until it's back home, so defending your base matters as much as attacking theirs.
- Dropping the flag. If the carrier dies, or leaves the match, the flag falls right where they went down. Anyone can pick it back up from there, including their own team.
- Returning your flag. If your flag is sitting on the ground after being dropped, one of your own teammates can walk up to it to send it straight back to your base.
- Being the carrier. While you're carrying the flag, your movement speed is capped and you can't use skills or items. See Movement fairness for how the speed cap works. Because carrying the flag makes you both important and vulnerable, killing an enemy carrier is worth extra to the killer.
- Turtling penalty. If both teams end up holding each other's flag for a long stretch of time, both carriers start taking increasing damage over time. This stops matches from turning into a permanent standoff.
Overtime
If both teams have the same number of captures when the clock runs out, the match goes to overtime. The flags are returned to their bases, both teams are sent back to their graveyard to be healed and rebuffed, and play restarts once the respawn cycle releases them.
From there, the first capture wins the match outright. If nobody manages to score in the 5 minutes of overtime, the match is decided on kills, starting with kills made during overtime.
Honor
In Capture the Flag, Honor comes from:
- Getting kills, more so if the kill is on the flag carrier.
- Taking the enemy's flag.
- Capturing (scoring with) the flag.
- Returning your own dropped flag.
See Honor for how the wider system works, including diminishing returns, the AFK rule, and match-end bonuses.