Combat rules

What's blocked#

• No aim assist with a gun. Free aim is forced on everyone, controllers included: nobody locks on to anybody with a firearm. Bare-handed and with melee weapons, lock-on stays, otherwise you could never land a punch.
• No combat roll. Jumping is blocked while you aim.
• No bunny hopping. Chain 3 jumps in under 4 s and your character trips.
• No vehicle weapons. Machine guns, rockets, missiles, boosts and jumps on special cars are disabled. Drive-bys still work, but the camera switches to first person while you aim, and back afterwards.
• No explosives for killing. The grenade is the only throwable explosive: 1 on you at most, and no more than one throw every 6 s. Rocket launchers, grenade launchers, molotovs and mines aren't sold, and the server cancels their explosions.
• Heist explosives stay tools. Sticky bombs and tear gas are sold at the gun store but can't be thrown: they're placed during a job (armored truck, Paleto, jewelry store...). See the gun store.

Two weapons, not the whole arsenal#

You only carry two weapons. The rest sits in your bag, and gearing up takes a 2.5 s animation. Hold TAB for the wheel (slot 1, slot 2, bare hands), 1 and 2 pull out the slot's weapon directly. All the details in Inventory.

What's on your side#

• Spawn protection: 10 s untouchable when you log in and after every death. It drops as soon as you aim, shoot or punch. Others see "Protected" above your head.
• No blips on the map: other players don't show up on your map, and you don't show up on theirs. You're only visible through the game: crewmates, bounties, contract targets.
• Stamina: you can sprint far longer than in story mode.
• Safe zones, in green on the map, where nobody shoots. Unless you have a bounty, stars, or just came out of a gunfight.

Don't log out to escape#

Quitting less than 30 s after trading shots with a player, or with stars on your back, counts as a death: your cash drops to the ground, and your opponent is told. Your stars wait for you for 30 min.

For what you lose when you die, see Death and respawn.

What it leaves behind#

Gunfights mark you, for real. Survive a firefight with very little health left and you keep a scar where you were hit last. At your 10th player kill, a teardrop tattoo on your face tells everyone. These marks can't be bought and no parlor removes them.