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Are you tired of being terrible at volleyball? Did you start out excited about this fresh new game mode but then after failing to rank up out of gold got bored and stopped playing? This guide is not only going to reinvigorate your love for volleyball and make you a better player, it might actually blow your mind. In this guide, we’ll share with you a pretty insane new way of thinking about volleyball that will revolutionize your gameplay and we’ll teach you how to do everything in the mode better including kick-offs, offense and defense. Basically, we'll teach you how to play volleyball like a grand champ.
Rocket League Sideswipe Volleyball Guide - How To Play Volleyball
Kickoffs
People absolutely suck at kickoffs, that's hopefully about to change because there is a super easy kick off that you can all start using right away whether you're on touch or controller and no matter what rank you are. Basically, this kickoff is just a fast aerial aimed at the middle of the ball, you jump off the ground, boost straight up to the ball, flip and hit the ball. However, there are a few really important things to understand that will make the difference between a good kick off and a bad kick off.
1. The first thing you'll want to do is aim up towards about the middle of the scoreboard. So about here which is exactly where the ball will be when it pops up.
Then hold boost, then as soon as the buzzer goes for the kickoff immediately jump while still holding boost and aiming up towards the ball. Once you reach about here, use your flip.
So there are a couple of really important things to know about this kickoff. The first is that you should not spam jump during the kickoff. If you spam jump, it's actually much slower than delaying your jump slightly. So even though it's much easier to get the timing right, don't spam jump, jump when the buzzer goes then wait till about here and jump again. A great trick for getting the timing right is if you hold aero, you should flip once your car has made a half turn.
2. The other important thing is to make sure you time your first jump exactly when the kickoff starts. Timing the jump too early or too late results in the same slow kickoff. So with all that in mind, your final kickoff should look like this and it should help you win or at least not lose every single kickoff in volleyball.
A New Way To Play Volleyball
When you first look at the volleyball field, there are two hearts, the blue team half and the orange team half. Which is exactly the same as every other game mode. The flaw is where you spend most of your time and then you take the ball from your half into the opponent's half to score a goal. Occasionally going up to the ceiling to make a play. So it's primarily a left to right movement or a right to left movement. However, there is a totally different way of looking at the volleyball field. Instead of just two halves, let's think of volleyball as having four quarters, two on the bottom half for the blue and orange team goals and then two on the ceiling for each opposing team. The bottom quarters for each team are the defending zones and the top quarters for each team are the attacking zones. In this model, the movement of play is actually this way.
When attacking it's up to down and when defending, it's down to up. Sideways movement should be thought of as a secondary focus like a bonus once you successfully defend and can then focus on pushing the ball towards your attacking zone. Put it all together and it will be beautiful.
Offense
Offense is mostly done from the ceiling which means that you're going to be spending a lot of time up there and will need an easy way to stay there rather than floating back down to the ground. The best way to stay up on the ceiling is to use the wave dash mechanic where you aim directly down and then jump to push the bottom of your car into the ground. Hold up on your joystick then let your calf fall off the ceiling and then once you reach about here, jump again to push yourself back up.
Once you're up on the ceiling, you should probably start thinking about your positioning, put simply the most ideal positioning in offense is to have both players on the ceiling. One on the edge of the attacking zone and one in the middle. Then if the defense tries to clear up the sidewall, this player can intercept and if they try to clear across field this player can intercept. In terms of rotation, it should look like this.
You make an attacking play, find yourself on the ground, then drive across the field up the net and back up to the ceiling. It just repeats like that until you get a goal. One of the most important things during rotation is that you do not jump up for the ball like this since you'll likely just hit it up into the air. Instead, rotate back and let your teammate attack the ball from the ceiling.
Attacking in volleyball is really just a matter of keeping that rotation as tight as possible and making sure that you always keep at least one player on the ceiling at all times. This is because the ceiling is the safest and best way for the defense to clear the ball. So you want to make sure you're always covering that area.
Defence
Defence in volleyball is mostly spent on the ground. Ideally, you'll have one player on the pad to block the ball coming across the pad and into the goal and you'll have one player on the goal itself to block any shots coming from above. Both players can clear the ball if given the opportunity either up the sidewall and across or directly up and over the net. Defense in volleyball is really all about two things, staying calm and being patient.
- So the first defense tip is to stay calm and make sure that you never double commit. Meaning don't both go for the ball at the same time. Make sure that whenever one player is trying to clear, the other one is waiting down in goal to block any incoming shots. This will ensure that you can avoid getting scored on but also that you'll have full boost to launch a counter attack.
- The second tip is to be patient and to not be afraid to abort your clear if an opponent can easily block it and maybe score on you. Sometimes, it's better to flip back down to the ground to defend instead of attempting a super risky clear. So be patient and wait for the right opportunity to clear the ball.
