Hey everyone! This past weekend my roommate and I got to round 64 on Ascension. I thought I would share our tactics with you guys, as well as some of the tricks we've learned.

• Early Game (1-9)

Don't buy any off wall weapons in the starting area. Knife only if you can for the first two rounds. Unload a clip and then knife for the third one. At the end of round three, exit through the TOP (leave bottom closed) door and buy the MP5K. One person should watch the window and path near turret, while the other watches the window by MP5k and the main launcher. When one of you has at least 5500 and the other has at least 4250, open the door by mp5k, the door with the fire pit trap, and the door to speed cola. Each of you should buy the sickle. Use the sickle with your m1911 out until the end of round nine.

• Mid Game (10-30)

Your first priority is getting power and juggernaut. Open the door from mulekick to power, NOT the one above juggernaut. Open the top door going down to juggernaut. When you can, open up stamin-up and the junkyard and use all of the launchers to unlock pack-a-punch.

• Perks

Player 1 - Stamin-up, Juggernaut, Speed Cola (or Flopper if you prefer it), and Mule Kick. NOTE: To avoid losing a good weapon from monkeys/downs, you should buy a points weapon immediately after mule kick. The best two are MP5K and AK74U. Player one will want the MP5K for reasons I'll go over soon.

Player 2 - Stamin-Up, Juggernaut, Flopper, and Mule Kick. Flopper is a must. Same cautionary tale with mule kick. After buying it, go and buy the AK74U.

• Weapons

These will make a lot of sense for late game, but aren't extremely point efficient until later. Just trust me.

Player 1 - Ray Gun, Thunder Gun, MP5K

Player 2 - Ray Gun, Mustang and Sally (PaP'd M1911), AK74U. Upgrade the M1911 first, then whichever you like.

Both of you will want gersche devices.

• Monkey Rounds

Monkey rounds - At the tail end of mid-game, monkeys will start to get a tad annoying. Here's what you need to know:

When the round starts, player one should wait ~5 seconds and turn on the turret outside the starting area. It does decent damage and is great for pointing monkeys out. Afterwards, he needs to run to staminup, turn on the trap, and kill the 2-3 monkeys that spawn in that area. When that's done, head to flopper and defend that.

Player two (the one with mustang / sally) will also wait ~5 seconds and turn on the other fire trap, then wait at the door to get to juggernaut. Kill any monkeys with the MS, then run up and defend Mule Kick and speed cola if player one decided to get it over flopper.

• Late Game (30 )

Late Game (30 ) At this point you need to decide on whether or not you want to go for speedy rounds or points. I prefer going for points. As a testament to the greatness of this strategy, my roommate and I are both in the top 100 (74 and 92) for points as a result of our last game. Player two starts at swamp, player one at flopper. Exhaust your AK74U/MP5K and get ready to run traps. Both players should run simultaneously. Player two will grab ammo, use the trap, and head to the launchpad by PaP for the next loop. Player two will grab AK74U, use the trap, and then SPRINT to flopper. Player two has much longer to run, so make sure you get to flopper quickly. Then rinse and repeat until the end of time.

Below you'll find some more advanced things that my roommate and I implemented to maximize points, minimize time between traps, and save our respective asses:

• Running your loops / Setting your traps

Running at junkyard/swamp: Use all of your ammo while building up the window closest to the launcher. When you've used it all, sprint to staminup, rebuy ammo, and run loops there. You'll be able to find out immediately when the traps reset. Let the flopper runner know. When he heads down, he should let you know when his zombies run through the gate by MP5K. That's when you re-buy ammo, set your trap, and head to flopper.

Running at PaP - Use all of your ammo and then run the loop right next to PaP, by the stairs. It can be a bit tricky running it at first, but you get used to it quickly. This also enables you to see when the traps reset. Once again, when it does, let the flopper runner know. Reset your group at PaP while he heads out, and then head back to the trap when his horde gets to the open area before the turret. Set your trap, buy more MP5K, and head to flopper.

Running at flopper - Run in a figure eight patern to avoid getting caught. If you do, run off of the catwalk on the right side of the launcher, regroup them at staminup or the loop by PaP, and head back to mid. If not, use all of your ammo and wait for your teammate to tell you the traps are ready. Then follow the advice in the previous two paragraphs, whichever applies to you.

• If someone goes down

First of all, don't panic. Take your time and join hordes so you can safely run to your teammate. Before picking the teammate up, throw out a gersche on the ground (aiming high tends to cause them to leave the map, and no one likes that.) and pick up your teammate. NOTE: When picking a teammate up, press the switch weapons button so you can shoot simultaneously.

• "Pausing the Gane"

If there's one thing I learned, these games do NOT go by quickly. Our 64 round endeavor lasted about 23 hours. Fortunately, we figured something out right before the end to give us much needed breaks. First off, both of you should get one zombie left. When you feel that the round is over, keep running your traps, but only have one person actually set it so that you don't end the round on accident. Once they stop respawning, try to have one of you pick off one zombie and distract him while the person with the horde uses a trap to take the rest out. After rounds 50-55, the ray gun is extremely inefficient for making crawlers. At round 63, it took me 80 ray gun rounds to make one. And he bled out after 5 minutes. Both of you should now head to flopper with the one zombie. Rebuild all of the nearby barriers and use the launcher to "kill" the zombie. He will respawn. Find him before he breaks through, get to the opposite side of the window, and hold x until the end of time. Seriously, you can put a rubber band around the controller and take a break for however long you'd like.

• Some more monkey info

Monkeys are extremely annoying at high rounds. Fortunately, you have a choke point at the one area that NEEDS defending (jug). All other perks are something you can survive without. Use claymores on the stairs up to flopper, mule kick (and speed cola if one of you got it) to slow them down / alert you to their presence. Claymores on stairs will hurt them, but on level ground, they will stomp them and take no damage. This is great for slowing them down. You do need to be careful not to stockpile claymores with this strategy in mind. Too many claymores will cause the game to crash. It happened to me at round 55 once, and I was not pleased. Heed my warning. The zeus cannon is a two hit monkey killer at all rounds. USE IT. Lastly, if a monkey jumps up to stomp you, just jump with him. You won't take damage.

• Late game power-ups

If any of you have gotten to late game, you'll know that power-ups don't come often. Power ups use the cumulative point gains in a round to determine whether or not they'll drop. You should use a gersche at the tail end of late rounds to try and take advantage of this. If you want, meet your hordes up by having the player not at flopper run there. Throw the gersche at the base of the steps up to flopper when the zombies are all close, then reset your positions. Hopefully you'll have power-ups as a result. We normally did.

That's all that I can think of for now. If you have any questions or comments I'd be glad to answer them.

Edit: Spelling, formatting, and all that good stuff.