How do you give up and respawn in WARDOGS?

The keys when you are down

Shacknews’ full PC keybind table lists Give Up under UI - General, bound to F, with no controller default printed. The other two rows below come from players, and the damage log’s name is unsettled: Team17’s own reply calls it the damage log, players call it the combat log.

Giving up costs you the kit, not the cash

BULKHEAD’s own rule is that each life’s equipment is bought from your cash balance, and that the balance persists between matches. Giving up ends the life, so everything you were carrying goes with it; your bankroll does not. Asked on 11 September whether the Escape route “suicide[s] you and lose[s] your kit”, a player answered “yes”. Waiting for a squadmate’s revive is the only exit that keeps the life you paid for.

Pressed F and nothing happened?

Three causes have been reported on Steam. None has an official fix, and the third turned out to be the reporter’s own mistake:

• The chat window is open. “You had the chat window open.” was the reply to a 24 September post asking why F did nothing.
• The key is greyed out. A 14 September report says the give-up key showed greyed out while the bleed-out meter sat stuck at 5%, but pressing and holding it still respawned the player.
• You rebound the interaction key. A 12 September report said changing the Interaction key removed the give-up button; Team17_Service replied, and the reporter later wrote “I was the problem”. If you have changed Interact, check Give Up still has a key of its own.

Reading the damage log

Players describe a log on B while you are down that “says exactly what happened, in minute detail”: filters at the top to show or hide incoming and outgoing damage, and which body part each hit landed on. Two things about it have been reported and acknowledged rather than fixed. Its default key can get in the way of other bindings — on 21 September Team17_Help replied that it understood “how bothersome it must be to have the damage log's default keybind interfere with other keybinds, such as proximity voice chat”. And a 30 September player could not find it anywhere in the keybinding settings, only the voice key.

What is not established

No source checked for this page — BULKHEAD’s included — publishes the following:

• Give Up, return to spawn and the damage log on a controller.
• The exact delay before the Escape menu’s return-to-spawn button appears, beyond one player’s “20ish seconds”.
• How long the bleed-out lasts before you die on your own.
• Whether the damage log can be rebound in the current build.

The Deployment Board: spawning at the APC instead of HQ

After you respawn at HQ you do not have to wait for a ride. The Deployment Board at HQ puts you at your team’s forward spawn — the M113 APC SV that someone has driven out toward the Control Zone. When a player’s APC spawn kept dropping them back at HQ, Team17 Support answered on 23 September: “There is a spawn button in the HQ deployment board … confirm that you’re clicking that and not the APC on the map.” Players add that the board beeps with a green light when a spawn is available, and that the tutorial never shows it. The forward spawn is the vehicle, not a FOB.

The M113 APC SV, the forward spawn vehicle →

1. 01

   Respawn at HQ

   Give up, or use Escape’s return-to-spawn, and you arrive at your faction’s HQ.

2. 02

   Find the Deployment Board

   Players describe it beeping with a green light when a spawn is available.

3. 03

   Press its spawn button

   On the board itself — Team17 Support says not the APC marker on the map.

4. 04

   Arrive at the APC

   You spawn at the team’s M113 APC SV, wherever it is parked.

How long until the APC is back, and how often you can spawn on it

BULKHEAD has not published a number for either of the two timers players ask about, and the two get mixed up. What is official: a destroyed spawn vehicle comes back at HQ and has to be driven out again — Team17_Assist on 25 September: “If it gets destroyed and someone needs brings it back from HQ to the zone, that new person will then earn the points.” Season 02 (15 October) makes it harder to kill — “Reduced Vanguard CIWS damage to the Spawn Vehicle, now takes 2.25x longer to kill the SV” — and locks it for anyone who switches team or joins late: “You cannot use the spawn vehicle until you reach the control zone for the first time.” Everything with a number in the table is players’ estimates, and none says it timed it.

• Season 02: no spawn-vehicle access after a team switch or a late join until you have reached the Control Zone once (official).
• The only cooldown in the Season 02 notes belongs to the Drill Rig, not the spawn vehicle; do not read it across.
• If the board will not deploy you, players say the vehicle is moving, damaged or destroyed — the board’s green light is the sign it is ready.

Common questions