Oil

Oil
Basic Information
Ability	Puddles of oil that will make vehicles slip out of control.
Range	On contact
Effects	Does not deal any direct damage by itself
Modifiers
Level 1	+1 Oil
Level 2	+1 Oil
Level 3	+1 Oil
Level 4	+20% Oil Size
Level 5	+20% Oil Size
Level 6	+20% Oil Size

Oil is one of the power ups in Crash of Cars.

Function

When picked up, an Oil barrel is mounted to the back of the vehicle.

When in use, the barrel will drop puddles of oil behind, while the user is immune to their own oil puddles for 1 second. If a vehicle comes in contact, the puddle vanishes, and the vehicle loses all acceleration as well as handling. The paralysis effect lasts for 2 seconds, during which the target would be visually slicked by oil, overriding any skins present. Momentum is kept, therefore it's possible for a car to start spinning rapidly when hitting oil. Duration can stack from multiple puddles.

If left untouched, Oil despawns after 15 seconds. They also vanish immediately if they are deployed in inaccessible zones.

Each oil puddle is deployed around 0.2-0.3 seconds after each other.

Sparkie

Upon contact with an oil puddle, Sparkie will turn into a fireball instead of being disabled. Any unprotected vehicles that come into contact with it will be instantly destroyed. It also gains enhanced acceleration and top speed, but its handling is penalized.

The fireball ability is not affected by any factors and lasts for 5 seconds, and each extra puddle increases this by 1 more second while the ability is active. This ability does not work in Blitz Mode, but it still retains oil immunity.

It will always receive Oil as the first power-up after spawn.

Inferno

Upon collecting two puddles of oil of any size, Inferno's flamethrower will be ignited.

It is not immune to Oil's negative effects.

Strategy

With

Oil is one of the most common power-ups, and its impeding ability is of significant assistance.

One of its most common uses would be to disrupt pursuing vehicles, especially in close range. As distance decreases the chances of affecting a vehicle escalates drastically. The effect can be used to disable most opponents, preventing them from catching up and providing the user time to distance themselves from the enemy. If there are multiple pursuers, a disabled enemy will also be able to briefly distract other enemy vehicles. While fighting enemies within the vicinity of a death zone, Oil's power drastically increases, as while it inflicts no damage, disabled enemy vehicles can end up within these danger zones, damaging everything not instantly destroyed as an indirect result. Faster vehicles are the most vulnerable as they keep their high momentum upon hitting a puddle, resulting in severe disorientation. Multiple puddles in a rapid succession can stack to lethal effect with a massive window of retaliation against the target.

It is ill-advised to use Oil against vehicles that benefit from it, unless the user is capable of avoiding their abilities. Also, the user can be disabled by their own oil puddles, so they should stay away from the vicinity until the puddles have vanished.

Against

Oil's primary weakness is its inability to inflict damage. To compensate, there are no surefire ways to neutralize the paralysis and any unforeseen consequences. As with Landmines, Oil works wonders in close range, but not so much at a distance where they can be easily avoided, effectively rendering them useless. As they do not have any other effects, the opponent will be forced to waste the power-up and switch to another.

The sole surefire method to neutralize Oil's negative effects would be Teleport, which not only offers brief invincibility but also warps the player away in most occasions. Other methods include the use of a Shield or Boost to simply negate any oncoming damage, although the user will not be able to escape certain death zones in these cases. In any case, being caught in Oil puddles equate to certain destruction if nearby threats are active.

There is little synergy with oil, although players can still manipulate them with specific vehicles to their advantage.

Trivia

• Oil's in-game properties are highly inconsistent with its real-life counterpart:
  • It is a highly flammable and volatile substance, so it is unknown why certain heat sources such as Flamethrower cannot ignite it.
  • When vanishing, Oil reuses its trigger animation upon vehicle contact. In reality, Oil does not make a splash as it takes much longer to evaporate.
  • Liquids have no effect on oil and cannot wash it away.

• Oil's ability is based on the common trope of land vehicles losing control when running over a puddle of liquid that significantly penalizes their traction. The effect is heavily exaggerated in-game.
  • This occurs less to vehicles fixed on static structures (Train, in which case only its acceleration and deceleration are affected), resistant to friction penalties or not heavily reliant on traction itself.
  • Furthermore, the puddle is too small to cover an entire vehicle. Even if it was large enough, simply running over a puddle would only somewhat decrease its velocity and penalize its traction, but it would not be encased entirely. Also, other vehicles should also be affected, as an oiled vehicle would spread the substance by splashing it to nearby vehicles' propulsion systems.

• The Babushcar's 3rd and 4th form lacked an oiled sprite prior to the Hollows Update. As the same also applied to skins, it can be presumed that Oil's visual effect carry properties identical to most skins.