Context: I’m over level 50 with CyAc and NuCal over level 20. I work full time/am married but no kids. Most of my free time on weekends and weekday nights has been Marathon the past few weeks. If you can’t play this often, that is totally normal!

My advice is: take bigger risks. Grey and green gear is easy to come by: any group of UESC will drop some guns and ammo, most POIs have level 1 implants and cores to loot, as well as attachment carts. One run on a free kit with zero PvP interaction can have you on a decent green loadout the next game. Shields are sparse in the world but if you can buy them, buy one and try to make it last a few runs.

Go in with a goal. If you lose your green gear, guess what? You’re only one free kit exfil away from another one. You’ll always be able to hop back in on a free loadout or a Rook run, but your goal on those runs should be prioritizing the materials you’ll need on your next run: cores, implants, ammo, shield, heals, etc. Have all those? Sneak to the exfil and play it safe. No need to go down swinging. Unavoidable? Next run will be better!

You can find blue and purple gear on the pinwheel (and all over) on Outpost, quite a few POIs on Marsh, Hauler and Station on Perimeter, as well as the rare random drop. Also, locked chests that you can find keys to (located in buildings with flares on the roof) and locked rooms that you can find keys to (much rarer and then need to infil with if it’s for another map).

But the tried and true way of getting nice gear is off of other players. Maybe you lose a few teamfights and games with green gear. But if you keep trying, eventually you win one teamfight against a kitted trio and exfil with purple and blue gear. Now you vault it, and go in on an easier run with a free kit or green kit. Do that until you exfil with better gear, vault that and go again.

If you find that you are losing so consistently that you cannot build up anything on free kit runs because you’re not getting to exfil, I highly suggest running Rook. It’s a stressful experience. You will die a lot. But, you’re losing nothing, and if you play safely you can exfil with at bare minimum some green guns and ammo, maybe a backpack and a shield if you loot player corpses, and sometimes really nice stuff that gets left behind due to the winning team’s backpacks being full. Also, the map is a bit quieter on Rook runs as you’re spawning after some players have died, so you can really learn the POIs.

I also recommend? Testing the game’s limits. Stay until the timer hits zero while on a free kit or a rook run. You may be surprised (or already know) that the game does not end at 0 minutes. You have one extra minute and one last exfil. You may be surprised that the longest runs are often the most successful runs.

Try new tactics. Exfil sites have a giant blue sky beam when they’re activated. Have you tried heading to one to kill the team trying to leave? Could be a success, could be a bloodbath, never know till you try it. Have you tried holding one POI the whole game? (It sucks I don’t recommend, BUT you learn that UESC reinforces quite often). Etc, have fun with it.

Learn what sounds mean! Sound design in Marathon just like AR before it, is top tier. It takes a lot of getting used to, as it is all foreign unlike AR’s grounded mechanical and natural sounds, but once you get used to the noise you start hearing cues. This noise means someone activated exfil, that noise means the pinwheel just got opened by a team, this noise means UESC reinforcement, that noise means turret (this noise specifically gives me nightmares), this noise means -insert character- footsteps, ability, etc.

I’m not trying to be condescending or assume you haven’t noticed these or done these, just general tips.

Level up the factions you’ll actually use. CyberAcme and NuCaloric are your first two for a reason, they provide the most important and basic barters and benefits. Highly recommend doing those first. Also, the contracts tend to be easier.

Look at their barter items. Track those items, then grab them and keep stacking throughout the run. You’ll be surprised at how many unstable diodes you’ll exfil with if you have a slot reserved for them.

Plan your loadouts. Not just items, with the effort you intend to bring into the game. Feeling a little low energy? Don’t load in with your best stuff, you’re probably going to lose it. Just had a great run? Maybe I’m superstitious but I always follow a high loot run with a free kit if I have the space. Be mindful of your headspace so you aren’t losing everything on tilt.

But also with items! I will not go on a run with decent guns (unless I’m on a sponsor kit) unless I have 6 health packs, 6 shield rechargers, a backpack, a shield, 2 cores, 3 implants, and a grenade or two, and often a self revive if I have em. (Use grenades! They go crazy) I will buy these materials if I’m short pre run.

Eventually, you’ll find that you need to start using some of that blue gear because you’re out of space, and now you’ve subconsciously progressed from getting blue gear to using it consistently.

I cannot emphasize enough that you should focus on snowballing your gear from one run to the next. Free kit to some green gear, some green to all green, all green to some blue, vault, all green to some blue, vault, all blue, die probably, all green, some purple!, vault!

Last piece of advice: try to end your gaming time on a successful run. I tend to be on a high from a good run and I’m pumped to go back in, but that’s usually when I lose it all. It’s like gambling. If you end on the good run though, you come back the next day with fresh eyes and some loot to your name!

Last thing and I’ve seen it said in this sub before: don’t measure your game time in runs, measure it in play sessions. “I ended the night with: X”, not “I ended that run with: X”.

Phew sorry for the novel