WARDOGS FAQStraight answers, rated

Neither. WARDOGS is an all-out warfare FPS from BULKHEAD, published by Team17, in Early Access on Steam since 10 September 2026. Up to 100 players split across three factions: Lonestar, Valkyra and Manticore.

A match is King of the Hill. Every 30 seconds the faction with the most players inside the control zone scores 1 point. First to 100 points wins. Kills score nothing directly, so staying alive inside the zone is the whole scoring job.

Inside the control zone a smaller yellow hotzone moves around. Standing in it counts you as two players, and every cash and XP payout doubles there.

Your cash persists between matches. You buy a kit before each life and lose what you carried when you die, but your balance carries on. That is the only thing it shares with an extraction shooter.

On the US Steam store, checked 12 September 2026: the base game is $39.99 [S1], the Supporter Edition (game plus Supporter Pack) is $49.99 [S1], and the Supporter Pack DLC on its own is $12.99 [S1].

The Supporter Pack is cosmetic only: three starter weapon camos (Valkyra A-91, Lonestar Bushmaster, Manticore KH-2002), a Little Bird "Taxi" camo, a supporter icon on the scoreboard that you can hide, and grenade and helmet bobbleheads.

Buy the base game unless you want to back the studio. Nothing in the pack affects cash, XP or combat.

Yes, through Steam's normal refund process. BULKHEAD itself told pre-order buyers to refund if the beta did not live up to expectations, and told players who bought expecting Linux support to refund.

Check Steam's refund policy page for the current playtime and purchase-window limits before you sink hours in. We do not quote them here because no official WARDOGS post states them.

Aim to end the hour with more than $10,000 [S1], Career level 6 or higher, and your New Recruit discount spent. Do not buy a helicopter, a FOB or a hammer yet. All three lose money on a $10,000 [S1] starting balance.

Before your first match, visit the firing range. Everything is unlocked and free there, so learn the controls without paying for mistakes.

Opening kit: binoculars ($75 [S1], or $38 [S1] with the discount), the free faction rifle, one magazine and five bandages, under $1,500 [S1] in total. Join a squad with Escape, then take a helicopter or vehicle to the zone. Never run it: the zone is roughly 3 km from spawn.

In the zone, spot enemies from cover, revive and bandage teammates (never yourself), and press Rebuy when you die. While you are still under Career 9, buy the Field Resuscitator blueprint ($10,000 [S1] full, $5,000 [S1] discounted) first, then Level 1 Armor + Helmet ($17,500 [S1] full, $8,750 [S1] discounted).

You can play without a group, but do not play alone. Press Escape in a match and create or join a squad. It is free, takes seconds, and gives you squadmates on your map and a private voice channel the enemy cannot hear.

There is no published squad size cap. BULKHEAD's February 2026 Top Questions post said squad sizes are unlimited, and no later official post changes that.

No group? Stay near your team, use proximity voice (nearby enemies hear it too), and look for community servers with regulars. Medic income collapses without a crowd, so pick roles that need no partner: spotting with binoculars early, and later a Talon SAM on a supplied FOB, which needs no aiming and no spotter.

No confirmed mechanical difference exists between Lonestar, Valkyra and Manticore. No source shows faction-exclusive weapons, vehicles, starting cash or progression. The one confirmed difference is cosmetic: each faction has its own free starter rifle. Pick whichever side your friends are on.

Your pick is not permanent. Press Escape and choose CHANGE TEAM. It works mid-match if the faction you want has open slots. If it is full, wait for players to leave.

BULKHEAD's FAQ describes teams as drop-in, drop-out and says one extra player on a team does not give it an unfair edge.

Partly. BULKHEAD's FAQ says controller support is limited in the current version, and the Steam store lists no controller support. Play on mouse and keyboard if you can.

Controller buttons cannot be rebound in game, and keybinds may not save. On some PlayStation controllers the LB and RB yaw bumpers do not work. Fix that with DS4Windows: remap the bumpers there, outside the game.

Controller settings can be applied to vehicles only, so a common compromise is flying on a pad and shooting on the mouse. Default pad flight: right trigger collective up, left trigger collective down, LB and RB yaw, left stick pitch and roll.

Play hotzone medic. It has the lowest skill floor, the cheapest kit (under $2,000 [BETA]) and the most reliable payouts. Revives paid $400 [BETA] in the open, $800 [BETA] in the control zone and $1,600 [BETA] in the hotzone.

Take the free Emergency Resuscitator every life, carry bandages, and work behind cover near teammates. Bandage others, never yourself: self-aid pays nothing. At Medic 2, unlock the Field Resuscitator ($10,000 [S1] blueprint, $500 [S1] per use).

Second choice: when any faction reaches 20 points, drive your team's free spawn APC into the control zone and guard it. It paid about $3,000 [BETA] on arrival plus $100-$250 [BETA] per teammate who spawns on it, and you risk nothing of your own.

The payout figures come from the beta. The Season 1 changelog lists price and XP changes but no cash payout changes, and nobody has re-measured them since.

Everything you were carrying. The kit you bought for that life is gone. Your cash balance, XP and paid-for unlocks stay.

So every life is a small investment: your profit for a life is what you earned minus what you brought. Keep the kit cheap until you reliably earn more per life than it costs, and press Rebuy at the vendor to repurchase your last kit in a couple of clicks.

A teammate who revives you before you bleed out saves the kit. That is why playing near other people is a cost saving, not just a social choice.

Almost certainly not. The $10,000 [S1] is a one-time grant when your account starts. It does not refill each match or on respawn. Spend it like seed capital.

Sources disagree. MetaForge's beginner guide says it is per round, and MetaForge's own editor note flags the contradiction. Every other source treats cash as one persistent balance, creators describe players going broke, and a per-match top-up cannot fit either fact.

Sources also do not settle whether a new grant arrives when a new season starts. Either way, a FOB at $7,500 [S1] eats 75% of it, so do not buy one on a fresh account.

At season end your cash and all level and XP progression reset, on every track including Career, and every blueprint you paid for goes with them. Leftover cash converts to Gold Bars automatically. Gold Bars and cosmetics bought with them are kept.

The authority is the in-game Gold Exchange text: progression and cash reset at the end of a major update cycle, and the date will be announced ahead of time. A developer forum post from March 2026 saying XP does not reset is out of date.

Beta progress did not carry into Early Access, and BULKHEAD's FAQ confirms pre-alpha cash did not carry into the full game. The FAQ does not mention beta progress directly, so treat that part as well supported rather than officially stated.

BULKHEAD also says each season gets a different XP curve and item order. Do not plan unlocks beyond the current season.

No official date yet. One creator, RageGamingVideos, says Season 1 lasts one month from 10 September, which would end it on 10 October 2026. No official post gives an end date.

Treat 10 October as a working assumption, not something to plan around. BULKHEAD says the reset date will be announced ahead of time, so watch Steam News.

Gold Bars are the currency that survives the season wipe. You exchange cash for them at a floating rate, and any cash left at season end converts automatically. BULKHEAD has pledged that Gold Bars and cash will never be sold for real money.

What they buy is disputed. BULKHEAD's February 2026 Top Questions post calls them the endgame currency for cosmetics in the Gold Market, and WARDOGS Hub and Legacy Gaming say cosmetics only. TheTacticalBrit says they buy usable items. Open the Gold Market and check the categories yourself.

Do not convert early. Cash is working capital that pays for your next unlock; gold does nothing until you spend it. Convert surplus in chunks once your cash exceeds the unlocks you still want.

There are no classes. Six role tracks level from what you do: Infantry, Medic, Support, Recon, Pilot and Driver. Career, also called Wardog level, is the sum of your six role levels, so no XP is wasted. Career gates armour, helmets, backpacks, vests, ammo types, optics and pistols.

Season 1 XP is cumulative: 35,000 [S1] to reach level 10, 110,000 [S1] for level 15, 250,000 [S1] for level 20 and 1,000,000 [S1] for level 50. Levels 15 to 20 are the wall at 140,000 [S1] XP for five levels. BULKHEAD expects the median player to be around level 20 after 20 to 25 hours.

To level fast, do everything inside the hotzone, where XP doubles. For Career, level Support: building, repairing, refuelling, logistics, explosives and high-value target kills all feed it. For one deep track, commit early and do not start a second deep track after the first week.

Every price is 50% off while your Career (Wardog) level is below 9. Sources split on whether level 9 itself is still discounted, so plan as if it ends the moment you reach 9. Once it ends, it is gone for good.

The window is short. Spend it on durable gear you will use all season, not consumables: Level 1 Armor + Helmet ($17,500 [S1] full, $8,750 [S1] discounted) and a good optic, since attachments carry across every weapon and class.

It is not confirmed whether the discount covers one-time blueprint fees or only per-life vendor prices. Check a blueprint's listed price before you count on the saving.

No, on BULKHEAD's own pledges. There is no battle pass and no pay-to-win. There is no monetisation during Early Access except the Supporter Edition, which is cosmetic only. Cash and Gold Bars will never be sold, and camos will never be sold directly.

What separates veterans from new players is unlocks earned with cash and XP, and those wipe every season.

$1,500 [BETA] per teammate you kill. That includes passengers who die when you crash a helicopter, and you can be fined when a passenger jumps out and breaks their legs even if your landing was fine.

The Season 1 changelog lists no change to it. Friendly markers render in your faction's colour, so on Valkyra your teammates are red: check before you fire. Learn to fly in the free firing range, never with passengers, and stock spare parachutes in the aircraft before takeoff.

No set classes. You buy the equipment for the role you want, and the gun in your hands decides which track earns XP. A bigger backpack lets you carry kit for two roles.

Assault rifles and pistols feed Infantry. SMGs feed Medic. Shotguns, LMGs and rocket launchers feed Support. Marksman rifles, sniper rifles and the compound bow feed Recon. Spotting feeds Recon, healing others feeds Medic, building and repairs feed Support, driving feeds Driver and flying feeds Pilot.

Not sure about an item? Hover it in the vendor or your inventory and it shows which track it rewards.

Medic is the one role where levelling and earning are the same action. Play it inside the hotzone beside the biggest friendly crowd you can find: revives there paid $1,600 [BETA] against $400 [BETA] in the open. Solo or duo, medic income collapses.

Kit: the free Emergency Resuscitator (one per life, cuts a roughly 30 second revive to 4-5 seconds), bandages, and an SMG so your kills feed Medic too. The PP-19 at Medic 4 is the early power spike.

Bandage teammates, never yourself: self-aid pays $0 [BETA] and no XP. Before reviving someone, check their inventory and use their own resuscitator on them.

The milestone is the Defibrillator at Medic 11: $50,000 [S1] to unlock, $1,600 [S1] per buy. It revives instantly at 35 HP instead of 10 and paid $2,400 [BETA] per revive in the hotzone. Buy it the moment you can afford it.

Less than you would think. Armour-piercing ammo does not unlock until Career (Wardog) level 82 for 7.62x54mm and 83 for 5.56mm, and BULKHEAD expects the median player to be around level 20 after 20 to 25 hours. Early in a season almost nobody in your lobby has AP.

FMJ, the default round, stays the right choice for a long time. In range tests AP did less damage than FMJ against Light armour (18 against 21) and only edged ahead at Medium plate.

Legs are unarmoured at every tier. Against a heavily plated enemy, shoot the legs.

Where veterans do pull ahead is armour and better rifles. Put your money into armour and one good optic first; attachments carry across every weapon. Which rifle to buy is argued between creators, so read the rifle card in the combat chapter before spending on one.

Learn in the firing range, not in a match. Enter the range from the main menu, talk to the NPC for a free Little Bird, and crash as often as you like. Escape, then return to the firing range, resets you at zero cost. In a real match, every teammate killed in a crash costs $1,500 [BETA].

Default mouse and keyboard flight: Left Shift collective up, Left Ctrl collective down, W nose down, S nose up, A and D roll, Q and E yaw, C camera toggle, V flares, G drop cargo. Press L to unlock the aircraft, or nobody outside your squad can board.

When landing, dump the collective the instant your first skid touches, or the aircraft tips and rolls. Before boarding any helicopter, buy a $100 [S1] Basic Parachute; it has its own slot and takes no bag space.

Every vehicle has two costs: a one-time blueprint that unlocks it at a track level, then a spawn price each time you bring it out.

Helicopters: MH-6 Little Bird $6,250 [BETA] to spawn, Pilot 0, no blueprint. AH-6M minigun Little Bird $7,000 [BETA], Pilot 4, $50,000 [S1] blueprint. Z20 Lakota transport $7,400 [BETA], Pilot 10, $35,000 [S1] blueprint. Havoc $18,000 [BETA], Pilot 35, $500,000 [BETA] blueprint.

Ground: Kodiak SUV $2,500 [BETA], level 0. URAL truck $5,000 [BETA], Driver 3, $35,000 [S1] blueprint. Humvee $3,000 [BETA], Driver 15, $25,000 [BETA] blueprint. L2A6 tank $14,000 [BETA], Driver 35, $500,000 [BETA] blueprint. SPH-2 artillery $8,000 [BETA], Career 90, $500,000 [S1] blueprint.

The Season 1 changelog confirms the AH-6M, Z20 Lakota, URAL and SPH-2 blueprint prices and the Driver and Career levels. Spawn prices and the other blueprints are wiki values it did not change, which is why this answer is Likely rather than Confirmed.

The M113 APC is free. It appears at your base when any faction reaches 20 points and works as a team spawn point once parked.

Disputed. It spawns for $12,500 [S1] at Pilot 20, but the blueprint is listed two ways: $250,000 [BETA] on the official wiki infobox, and $200,000 [S1] on wardogs-wiki.com and in WARDOGS Hub's Season 1 guide.

Our lean is $200,000 [S1], because wardogs-wiki.com's other unlock costs match the Season 1 changelog exactly. But the changelog lists no AH-6R change at all, so neither figure is proven. Check the Pilot vendor before you save for it.

Three maps, each with three variations, per a BULKHEAD devlog from 11 August 2026. MetaForge names them Bakurani, Ozeti and Zestafona; creators often mangle the names, so match them with care.

Six helicopters are documented from vendor data. The Season 1 ground roster runs from the Bobcat quad up to the L2A6 tank, the SPH-2 artillery piece and the free M113 APC.

No official post text gives total weapon or vehicle counts. A count from the devlog video circulates second-hand; we have not verified it, so we do not repeat it.

BULKHEAD's Early Access plans include more maps, weapons and vehicles, including fighter jets.

$7,500 [S1] at the vendor, up from $2,500 [BETA]. That price rise is in the official Season 1 changelog.

It ships with 1,250 build supply, 100 each of fuel, ammo and parts, and a small and a medium hammer. There is no large hammer inside.

The Large Hammer is Support 8, with a $75,000 [S1] blueprint and $2,400 [S1] per buy. You need it for the L81 mortar, the Talon SAM and everything else on its build pages.

Get a backpack bigger than the free starter bag first. The FOB is a 3x2 item and will not fit otherwise.

Where to buy it is disputed. The demonstrated route is from a vehicle that can hold items: press B, go to Items, open the Building tab. One creator says the base vendor sells it; another says it does not. Use the vehicle menu. An ATV will not work because it cannot hold items.

Drop the FOB where you want to build. It creates a square build zone around itself. Place a structure silhouette, confirm it, then swing at the yellow X marks: about 10% progress per X against 1-2% per blank swing. Click once per swing instead of holding the button, and stand at maximum reach so the next X spawns close.

Supplies in your truck do nothing. Drive into the build radius, press G once per pallet, then get out and hold F on each dropped pallet to deposit it.

No. A FOB is a build zone, not a respawn point.

Your team's forward spawn is the M113 APC. It appears at your base when any faction reaches 20 points. Someone has to drive it to the front and park it, and it only works as a spawn while stationary. Parking it at a FOB with cover protects it.

Enemies can stop spawns on an APC without destroying it by shooting the antenna or radar dish on its roof, so guard it.

The hotzone drifts at random inside the control zone until someone forces it. There are two ways to do that.

Towers: climb one, clear it, find the ops room (usually one floor above your entry) and hold F on the main console until the bar fills. You get one digit of a master code. Post it in team chat immediately. When your team holds every digit, enter the full code at a keypad on a tower you control and the hotzone moves to that tower.

Drill Rig: build one at your FOB and feed it fuel from the FOB's supplies. When active it pulls the hotzone to itself, which costs a lot but needs no towers. Fortify first and activate second, because the enemy comes to you.

Tower counts vary by map and by match, so check the map every game.

It can be, if you build to operate rather than just to build. Building is a lower-risk, slower income than the fast methods, and you can level Support without fighting.

The best solo setup is a Talon SAM on your own FOB. The missiles lock on by themselves, it needs no spotter, and it fits inside a fresh FOB's 1,250 build supply. You need the $7,500 [S1] FOB and the Large Hammer.

The evidence is thin. One creator's Season 1 solo run was still profitable. In another creator's session the SAM crew lost money while a friend playing sniper and medic earned far more. The SAM operator is also defenceless: anyone who walks up can shoot you off it.

Minimum: Windows 10, Intel Core i5 8600 or AMD Ryzen 5 3500, 16 GB RAM, Nvidia GTX 1660 or Radeon RX 590, 50 GB storage. BULKHEAD rates that as 1080p Low at 60 fps, upscaled.

Recommended: Windows 11, Intel Core i7 12700K or AMD Ryzen 7 5700X, 16 GB RAM, Nvidia RTX 3070 or AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT, 50 GB storage. That targets 1440p Medium at 70 fps or more native, or 4K Medium at 60 fps or more upscaled.

A 64-bit processor and OS and a broadband connection are required. The game is Windows only.

Four settings matter most for frame rate, in order: shadows, view distance, global illumination and reflections. Set shadows low, turn global illumination off, and set reflections low.

For aim: aiming coefficient 0%, FOV 90-110, and ADS field of view set to independent.

Season 1 clamps shadows to Low on machines that benchmark well instead of letting them switch off, which closed the old no-shadow visibility trick. View distance caps at 1 km, and DLSS Frame Generation can now be turned off without a restart.

Not officially. Linux is not supported, and BULKHEAD could not commit to it for the Early Access launch. The Steam store lists the game as Windows only and marks Steam Deck as Unsupported.

BULKHEAD says it is still working on official Proton compatibility, with no date. An earlier community-manager message suggesting Linux support was called a communication mistake, and any alpha or beta where Linux worked was happenstance. If you bought it for Linux, the developer's own advice is to refund.

First check whether it is your end. Errors 1413677057 and 1628505085 mean online services are unreachable. They are server-side, so do not reinstall. 1147405308 is a build mismatch: verify your game files in Steam. 1628505091, the launch join timeout, was fixed by Hotfix #1 and needs a client restart.

Anti-cheat failures (0xc0000142, "anti-cheat service refused", "Please unload X.sys", blue screens or reboots) are usually caused by RGB or hardware-monitoring kernel drivers such as inpoutx64.sys. The reported fix is to stop and disable that driver service, repair the anti-cheat install, then verify files.

Which anti-cheat it is remains unresolved. The Steam store names Elytra kernel-level anti-cheat, while community troubleshooting refers to an EasyAntiCheat folder. More than one system may be involved.

Season 1 fixed several crash paths, including buildables, the chat box and frame generation, and Patch 0.11 addressed more GPU crashes. Update the game before you troubleshoot anything else.

Voice or mic cuts out mid-match: open the scoreboard and press U twice to mute and unmute, or toggle Voice Chat off and on in settings. Check Windows microphone permissions and whether you are on push-to-talk. Season 1 fixed voice dying permanently after a failed join, so update first.

Stuck on audio-device selection, or no sound at all: set your Windows output format to 24-bit / 44.1 kHz. That is one report and the bug is still open.

Mouse spinning or punching on its own: another controller or macro is conflicting. Disconnect other input devices. Also one report, still open.

Flight sticks: HOTAS bindings do not persist between sessions, so expect to remap each time. If mouse and keyboard stop controlling the helicopter, disable HOTAS.

BULKHEAD says around 1 to 2 years, says it does not want to stay in Early Access long, and notes the estimate may change. No full release date has been announced.

Consoles: BULKHEAD's FAQ and its launch trailer post both say WARDOGS is coming to consoles in 2028. Nothing more specific has been announced.

Expect progression resets during Early Access. BULKHEAD says each season gets a different XP curve and item order.

Probably. The store says the price is lower during Early Access and may rise closer to full release. No official post text gives a date or a new price. If you are going to buy, sooner is the cheaper side of that statement.

Planned for the full version: more maps, weapons and vehicles, new vehicle types including fighter jets, expanded weapon categories, more objective variations, deeper progression and a stronger seasonal meta game, plus ongoing balance and performance work.

Next on the list from Patch 0.11: community server favourites, tiered priority queues for community servers, a Message of the Day prompt, better warmup activities, an option to disable AFK kicking during seeding, and team switching controls. BULKHEAD says these are separate from Season 2 content.

BULKHEAD announced 1.25 million copies sold on 11 September 2026, the day after launch, and thanked players for 400,000 peak concurrent users in its Patch 0.11 post on 12 September.

Reviews were mixed at launch: the Steam store showed 66% positive of 13,104 reviews on 11 September. Expect queues at peak times.

Yes. BULKHEAD has three approved hosting partners: QONZER, BisectHosting and xREALM. The Host a server button in game links to the hosting page.

Community servers are worth it for more than control. Their admins can ban bad actors instantly, which BULKHEAD itself recommends as an answer to cheaters. Patch 0.11 split the browser into Community and Official, gave community servers persistent IDs you can join by, and added a 5% end-of-match cash bonus on community servers for one week.

No official post states host prices, slot minimums, server files or mod support. Check each host's own page.

Launch demand overwhelmed login. Hotfix #1 on 10 September forced a client restart, admitted players in controlled batches, and fixed join failures and mid-match kicks, including error 1628505091. If you still see that error, restart the client so the update applies.

Errors 1413677057 and 1628505085 mean online services are unreachable on BULKHEAD's side. Wait rather than reinstall.

Planned downtime: servers go down for about 1 hour on Monday 14 September 2026 at 08:00 UTC for Patch 0.11, which also adds server capacity in Asia.

WARDOGS runs kernel-level anti-cheat with client and server-side detection. The store names Elytra; community troubleshooting refers to Easy Anti-Cheat, and whether both are involved is unresolved. Report cheaters in game, but do not spam reports: since Season 1, repeat and bad-faith reporters count for less.

Cheating can bring a permanent account ban, which may extend to other Bulkhead games, or a hardware ban, without warning. Deliberately exploiting bugs or glitches is also bannable.

Patch 0.11 spelled out economy bans. Abusing cash exploits: a timed ban and your cash and XP reset to 0. Making content that teaches economy exploits without reporting them: permanent ban. Joining a known XP-farming server for more than a few minutes: permanent ban, and BULKHEAD says it tracks every server an account enters. Testing something once or twice is fine; repeating it is abuse.

If a trick looks too good to be intended, report it and stop using it.

Since Season 1 the "kicked from server" message only appears for an actual ban, and bans are announced in the server when match termination is off.

Dropped to the main menu mid-match with "Returning to main screen"? That was the launch join bug fixed by Hotfix #1, not a ban. Restart the client. On community servers, admins can also remove players themselves.

Appeals: only permanent account bans can be appealed. Email appeal@bulkhead.com with your account name and platform; the response target is 30 days. Temporary suspensions and hardware bans are final.