There is no angle.

Extensive guide on the no-angle surf technique. This is an updated version of the previous guide with better explanations, nicer graphics and the easy way to control it that I left out of the last guide!

Introduction

Hello, and welcome to "There is no angle."! You may have seen my previous guide on no-angle, or you may not have. Feel free to check it out; but it won't have any information that this guide doesn't contain!

As with last time, wondering what no-angle is? Here is a video of mine which showcases it (and some other surfing) (*cough* shameless self-promotion *cough*).

No-angle is where I change direction whithout changing where I look.

This guide will not only explain how to do it, but how/why it works.

Who am I?

You might want to know who I am before you read the guide, if not; skip this section.
I am Pyro, I have 1800 hours of surfing experience (And have been using no-angle for about 400hours of that). I am also the creator of CS:GO Redie[forums.alliedmods.net] and SwitchKnife[forums.alliedmods.net].

The Bind.

No-angle requires a bind. For those of you who think "binds are for noobs", get out...

bind <key> +strafe

Example, if I want alt (the default key) to enable noangle I would type in console:

bind alt +strafe

The '+' at the front might remind you of '+forward', '+moveleft', or even '+left'. That is because if you bind a key to a command starting with '+' in source, then (essentially) it is only 'active' while the key is being held down; for example, when you press W to go forward you only move forward while W is down. Similarly, no-angle will only be active while your chosen key is down.

Now let's discuss what happens while no-angle is active. First off, it stops you from being able to turn (both with mouse and turn-binds). If you can still turn while you are holding down your chosen key, then sadly you have done something wrong :(.

Now, the reason that it stops you from being able to turn is because it converts your turning motion into moving motion. If you turn to the left you will move left, using turnbinds while in no-angle will move you the same as normal movement so doesn't have any benefit.

It's at this point that I recommend you try standing still and moving your mouse while in no-angle. You won't move much, but it should be noticeable. It is also worth noting at this point that no-angle is affected by sensitivity; if you ramp up your sensitivity you will notce you move much faster (however, making it too high will cause you to not move at all).

You have probably also tried to do some no-angle in the air and discovered that you're still missing something. That's where the next sections come in.

Air strafing

You're so close to being able to control it! So this is where I explain how it works. To help you understand we are going to be looking at a right-hand turn by George (the terrorist).


From looking at the above animation, you should be able to tell that the blue line represents the way George is facing, while the red line represents the angle his 'D' key is pointing. By this I mean that if at any point George were to be on the ground without and momentum, he would go in the direction of the red line.

I'll skip right to the point; the blue line (the way George is facing) doesn't matter at all. If you know how sideways/backwards/half-sideways/backwards-half-sideways works then you should under stand this, if not then don't worry.

Below is George doing the exact same right-hand turn, but with no-angle.


Notice how the only difference between the two is the blue line; this is what I mean by it doesn't matter, only the red line does.

So what have we learnt? To do something in no-angle, we have to simulate the same red lines as if you were to do it normally. And since no-angle lets you walk in any direction, this is entirely possible. However, there is a problem. The animations only show 5 frames, while in reality there are a lot more, this means you can't just drag your mouse in one direction then another over and over trying to turn; you need a smooth motion that will always give you the correct angle during the turn.

If you keep track of the red lines, and add them to eachother you can see the smooth motion you need to make.


In this case it's a quarter-circle. Keep in mind that this is only 5 frames, so the circle isn't very smooth but it is just a representation.

Using this idea you can now design turns and maneuvers. But who wants to design them when you could just do them on the spot without thinking about it? On to the next section!

The Clock Method

Now comes the fun part! I call this the clock method, however it might be easier to think about it like an old telephone (you know the ones where you spin the dial around?). I prefer clock simply because I love the way clocks work (seriously, check it out; it's amazing). Enough chit-chat let's start!

This is a universal rule of how to control no-angle with minimal effort; it might take you a bit to get used to it, but once you do you can do it instantly like muscle memory.

At any point in surf you are doing one of two things: flying straight, or turning. Flying straight in noangle is as easy as normally, you just don't do anything; so we need to focus on just turning.

So let's look at a clockface:

This next part requires some visualization.
First imagine your player (or in this case good ol' George) in the center of the clock facing the 12. And now since George is about to do no-angle he isn't going to turn where he is facing, he will always be facing 12 o'clock.

George should already have some momentum, if he is surfing forwards, the momentum will be towards the 12, if he is surfing backwards the momentum will be towards the 6 etc. For this example George only likes surfing forwards and no-angle. Let's say he wants to do a right-hand turn again.

So imagine your mouse at his starting momentum angle (in this case the 12), to do a right-hand turn (or to turn to the angle at 3 o'clock) all you have to do is hold down your no-angle bind and move your mouse around the edge of the clock from 12 to 3. Here's a picture to help:
The black line symbolises the current momentum direction, and the green line symbolises the desired momentum direction. So to go from the current to the desired, just hold down your no-angle key and move it along the orange line from 12 to 3.

This is a basic example, however this technique will work for any turn.

F.A.Q

Now that you know how to do no-angle, here are some frequently asked questions which may help.

Q: How do I do faster turns?
A: Move your mouse through the motion faster. However keep a couple things in mind: the faster you do it the less control you will have, and faster turns won't work on low airaccelerate servers.

Q: Why do I randomly stop?
A: If you randomly stop midair when doing no-angle then it might be because your sensitivity is too high. Higher sensitivities aren't good for no-angle as a small mistake will have a bigger impact which means you need to be smoother. A solution to this is to set up a special no-angle bind which will decrease your sensitivity while using it, an example is below:

alias +strafe_sens "sensitivity <lower sens>;+strafe"
alias -strafe_sens "sensitivity <your sens>;-strafe"
bind <key> +strafe_sens

Again, replace '<key>' with your chosen key, and '<your sens>' with your current sensitivity. Experiment with changing '<lower sens>' until you find a nice sensitivity (if you can't find one then sensitivity isn't your problem). Keep in mind that since this uses an alias, it will need to be in your autoexec.cfg.

Q: Why is this guide called "There is no angle"?
A: Well first off it's a pun; but its mainly about the animation showing that the way your player (or George) is facing doesn't actually matter. Plus it's a reference to "there is no spoon" with the idea of realising this fact will allow you to do magical things.

[Headless]

Cool, thanks Icarus.

[riggsy]

ty Pyro <3

[OK]

Great guide

[fIzzie Drink]

Thanks, ttp. Keep it up.

[6c6f6c20726970]

Thanks for the guide ttp!