Capturing and deploying resonators on a portal is like putting up a flag. Think of portals marked on your map as sites on which you can erect a flag. A grey portal is an ideal site for a flag--it is not yet under the control of either team (faction). A blue portal is under the control of the Resistance team, a green portal is under the control of the Enlightened. In order for one team to remove the other team’s flag, they must first render it “neutral”--grey in color. We do this by using XMP bursters, which are the tools by which we remove the opposing factions “flag”. But more on that later...
Placing a Flag (Deploying on a Portal)
You can’t just throw a flag in the ground and expect it to stand up to wind and rain (or the other team’s attack!). Think of your flag pole as needing support ropes with stakes to hold it upright, like the photo to the right. “Resonators” are your stakes. You can place anywhere from 1 to 8 resonators on any given portal, and obviously the more you place, the sturdier your flag (portal) will be.
Strong "Ropes" = Strong Portals
The closer in your place your stakes, the more wobbly your flag will be and the easier it will be to pull up all your stakes without much effort. By contrast, the further out you place your stakes, the more stable your flag will be, and it will make it harder for an opposing agent to come by and tear your flag down. Imagine if I walked up to your flag and it had a tight little cluster of stakes all around the base of the pole. I could crouch down and just grab all your stakes in one fist-full and yank them out of the ground, and your flag would topple in no time. If I have to walk from one stake to the next, crouching down at each and pulling them out at larger intervals, it's gonna take longer to pull your flag down and cost more energy on my part. This is what you want--to make your enemy work harder and spend more energy and resources to take your portal down!
BEGINNING TASK
Walk up to a grey portal, placing yourself physically as far away from the center of the portal as you can while still having it within your reticule (that yellow circle which shows your range of influence, which is 39 meters around you).
Click on the portal, and you should see the second option down on the right side menu is “Deploy”. If this button is greyed out, the portal may be outside your reticule. Take a few steps toward the portal and see if it lights up, indicating it is clickable. When it is, click on it! (if the portal is clearly in your reticule/range of influence but the button is still not clickable, make sure you have enough XM. Either walk around and pick up more XM from the region, or use a Power Cube)
You will see a ring of hexagons on your screen, which represent the locations you can place your resonators. Choose a resonator from your side-scrolling menu at the bottom of your screen and click “Deploy”. You will hear a sound and see an animation, and one of those hexagons will fill with your resonator. You just placed a stake on your flag!
INTERMEDIATE TASK
Placing your highest level resonators at the furthest compass points from one another makes them less vulnerable to a close-in attack. So, for instance, a Level 7 agent may place a Level 7 resonator at the north compass point, then place their level 6 resonators at the SE and SW compass points, keeping their highest level resonators as far from one another as you can. For a Level 8 agent, starting at north and moving around your resonators could be placed 8-4-5-6-7-4-5-6, which would give you excellent level spread on your resonators.
ADVANCED TASK
In addition to spreading out your resonators, sometimes considering which is the most vulnerable direction of attack may inform your deployment strategy. For instance, let's say your portal is a mural on the front of a building. The mural faces East toward a parking lot, and the building (a church, closed most weekdays, let's say) is to the West. Placing your highest level resonators so they overlap with the interior of the inaccessible building to the West, rather than over the parking lot where most agents will approach from, can protect them from more direct damage, thus it will take more bursters and XM to take down since agents can rarely (or perhaps never) get really close to the highest level resonators.
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