How to Play Defense on an Attack/Defense CP Map

This seems relatively simple ostensibly, set up a few good Engineers, Heavies, and Demomen, and you should be fine. However, there are a bunch of nuances that can separate victorious team from dominant ones.

Engineers play an extremely important role. However, unless they can set up camp, they are useless. Therefore, having a combat class stick by an Engineer while he builds defense for himself gives him something to make sure he doesn't get overrun, and therefore allows him to do this quickly. This is extremely important when, after you lose a point, he tries to roll back to the next point for the taking. The quicker this can get done, the quicker you can create a bottleneck.

There are two stages of a defense: Rush and Bottleneck. The former is when he other team seems to be attacking points with relative ease, and the latter is when defense is in control. Even though the latter seems like a good place to be all the time, a good rush can allow for a powerful defense. If you decide not to defend a certain point, you can use this to give time for a buildup of Engineer nests in key places which are difficult to ascertain in a quick rollback. Also, it allows other classes to get into places which make them the most useful.

The key classes in defense other than Engineers are Medics, Demomen, and Snipers. The latter are only useful if they are good, as they can stop any class with ease with a well placed headshot. Two good snipers can stop any offensive in its tracks. The Spy can alternatively do this, but it's much more difficult to perform this as Spy. Demomen can spam grenades around corners and down checkpoints, laying down suppressive fire which will force a team to not move. Since respawn times near 20 seconds all the time, Medics become very important in this style of play. If you can heal classes you can't afford to lose, you give them another life within which to perform their duties.

How to Play Arena

Arena is a style of TF2 Gameplay in which two teams are set in a relatively small map, with the goal being to eliminate the other team or to capture a central Control Point, which does not become available until late in the match. There is no respawning in Arena. It is difficult because instead of strategy based on trying to accomplish some objective, the player must come up with strategy for one single purpose: killing.

Arena maps are generally divided chronologically into two stages: territorial, and non-territorial. The former is when the RED team is generally in one spot as with the BLU team, and the latter is when there is no general spot each team can call their own. The former becomes the latter when the finding of enemies leads everybody all over the map. The former can be prolonged for an entire round by a good engineer who can keep a sentry nest going with people healing all the time in their team's base, but the latter can be brought about more quickly by a set of good Scouts who isolate the core of the opposing team.

This segregation of the round lends an important difference between this and any other style of TF2 play: in other types of gameplay, such as Payload and Capture Point, one team can be said to come from one side, and the other from the other side. This is lost in the second half of Arena matches. Scouts can use this to their advantage. It is difficult to Scout in the first half of Arena matches, as everybody is generally in the same spot, but once everyone scatters, the Scout becomes the main killer. If you're playing Scout, you should be focusing on hit and run for the first half, while going for kills in the second half. Not only will the other team be weaker (barring good Medics), but they will be all over the place.

Healing is important in Arena. There are no medpacks, and once you die, you're not coming back. Therefore, it's important to have at least one Medic on your team, which should avoid combat at all costs. This becomes hard in the second part of Arena matches, as combat is all over the place. Therefore, a Heavy or Soldier should be protecting the Medic from harm.

The point is a good way to get turtling Spies or Engineers away from their comfort zone and towards combat. If people are capping, they will win unless stopped. Therefore, they will come out the woodwork to try and kill you. If there's only one person left on the other team, and they're turtling waiting for people to come by, try to cap, and when it gets close, they will try to kill you.

Other than this, every decision you make should be either to stay alive or to kill someone. If you're lowering in health, prefer the former, and if you're well off, prefer the latter. This is the key to Arena.

Spy

One of the most difficult classes to play, Spy is less point, click, then shoot; and more about infiltration than anything. Spies have one of the only instant-kills in the game, the backstab, and have the only item designed specifically against one class, the sapper. This makes them highly specialized.

GENERAL STRATEGY

As a spy, trust your cloak, not your disguise. When you're cloaked, nobody can see you. When you're disguised, people can monitor your behavior and spycheck you. If you bump into anyone while disguised, you will be immediately shot, whereas if you're cloaked, you can get away and have them shoot wildly. They will be on full alert, true, but it will pass if you are patient. This is the number one skill of successful spies. Be patient. Don't go for a risky backstab immediately, wait until it becomes more clear. Don't sap while the Engineer is working, wait until he goes and gets metal.

The old debate goes: sap then stab, or stab then sap? Do you sap the Engineer's buildings then kill him, or take care of him first? The answer lies within a couple of factors. First, consider the damage caused by the sentry once you undisguise yourself. If it's level one, or distracted by someone else, you should be fine. Second, consider the knockback. If you're knocked back by the sentry after you kill the Engineer, you're dead, as you can't approach the sentry to sap it. Overall, it's better to sap then stab.

Engineers will have two responses to your saps: either unsap, or try and kill you. They will undoubtedly know you are a spy, so they will react most definitely in one of these two ways. If he tries to unsap, keep applying the sapper. You have an unlimited supply, so you should be able to keep going until it dies. After a while, though, most Engineers will try and attack you with the wrench, so back off and shoot him to death.

Backstabbing is often called the primary of the Spy. If you're not trying to sap, you will be trying to kill via backstab. Nobody goes for the revolver kill. It is a useful tool for getting out of tough situations, but it's not the ultimate goal. Backstabbing should be for primarily slow enemies. Kill Heavies, Soldiers, and Snipers, mostly. Not only will this take out a huge part of any team's offense or defense, it will cause the rest of the team to focus on finding you which, if you're good, will take a while. At this point, your team can push, taking down the confused team. Second, backstabbing should only be done once you're sure. If you've managed to avoid enemies thus far, you can wait a couple more seconds. More times than not I've gone for the backstab and the enemy turned around right as I was trying to kill him.

AVOID PYROS AT ALL COSTS. If you walk near one and he even accidentally presses his Mouse 1 button, you're dead. Don't even try to backstab them, they will be constantly spychecking and therefore will kill you often.

UNLOCKS

Ambassador (First unlock, replaces Revolver) - Slight damage dropoff for accuracy (with a cooldown), and crits on a headshot. I would definitely use this. Wait for the cooldown if you can, so you can have pinpoint accuracy for the headshot crits, which can end any firefight relatively quickly.

Cloak and Dagger (Second unlock, replaces Watch) - Indefinately recharges while standing still but, while moving, runs down based on how far you have moved. I don't like this because I pick up metal on the battlefield to recharge my cloak (And to piss off enemy Engineers), but many people use it as a way to hide until the opportune moment is found. Use at your own discretion.

Dead Ringer (Third unlock, replaces Watch) - If you have it out, fakes your death if you recieve nonlethal damage and cloaks you for up to 8 seconds. I don't like this because, along with the inability to pick up metal for cloak, it makes an obnoxiously loud sound when uncloaking, and most people can figure out a Dead Ringer Spy as soon as they shoot.

Sniper

Sniper being the most straightforward class (Find a spot, aim, BOOM HEADSHOT), this post will be relatively short and will only deal with the weakness of the sniper, close combat, and the unlocks.

GENERAL STRATEGY

Other than the progression mentioned above, Sniper has only one other thing to consider: close combat.

Close combat is fought by a Sniper as a means of getting away, not of actually trying to kill. You want to hold him off until a combat-oriented class can come over and finish him off. Let your team know you need help (Either through voice chat or voice commands) and (hopefully) they will help you.

Jarate makes the Sniper a more support-ish support class by giving him an aspect beyond that of hiding far away and shooting people every once in a while. You can put out fire, which makes Arena matches infinitely easier, and you make enemies take more damage, making winning said matches easier.

UNLOCKS

Hunstman (First Unlock, replaces Sniper Rifle) - Makes Sniper a viable mid-range combat class. Useful for Arena, where there are few Sniper nests. However, makes long-range combat difficult. Use discretion.

Razorback (Third Unlock, replaces SMG) - Don't ever use this. The benefit (blocking one backstab) isn't useful in most situations versus the detriment (slower speed + loss of the SMG).

Jarate (Second Unlock, replaces SMG) - Useful if you're using the Hunstman, as you're in the thick of combat already. If you like to camp far away from the rest of your team, use SMG as your out if it gets back. Otherwise, if you're with your team, use Jarate.

Medic

TF2Wiki

It's midway through an arena round. Half of your team is gone, as well as theirs. Everybody is rushing back to spawn, with half of their health whittled away. At this point, Medics are crucial. They form the backbone of an offensive in a CP push map, keep the cart moving in payload, and stop people from dying in Arena. It isn't difficult to play medic, but it's one of the most important classes for every playtipe.

GENERAL STRATEGY

The way a Medic stays alive is through having a team around him. Even though you may be paired up with a Heavy, merely having one teammate around you will leave you exposed. It is often smart to abandon a rambo-style player for the rest of your team, even if that rambo is a "traditional" medic partner, i.e. a Heavy or Soldier. Doing so will keep the majority of your team fueled with health, and will keep you alive longer.

If you are hanging around with a Heavy or Soldier, try to keep them within your line of sight without being in the line of sight of the other team. This will also keep you alive. Communication is key. If neither of you have microphones, use the voice commands (brought up ingame by pressing c or x) to communicate. This is crucial when your Ubercharge meter fills, as only the combat half of the team knows when he needs it.

The Ubercharge is the ultimate goal for a medic. The ten seconds of invulnerability (or of critical hits with the Kritzkrieg) can swing the momentum of a round on its head, giving you an advantage. Therefore, tell your team if you're nearing one so they can protect you more. If you do get 100%, the loud "I am fully charged!" should let them know to get a class able to commence a good Ubercharge attack over.

Speaking of which, the Heavy is not good for Ubercharges. The large spray and the stop-and-go movement involved with that class makes most attacks fail. The best class for Ubercharges is the Pyro. He can constantly put out damage with the flamethrower, and can turn wildly to damage an entire team. He can also destroy buildings easily with the constant damage he puts out. His speed also makes most attacks effective, leaving a wake of fire wherever he goes during the 10 seconds.

UNLOCKS

Blutsauger (First unlock, replaces the Syringe Gun) - Largely considered to be the most upgrade-ish of the unlocks in the game. This roughly means that the downside (no crits) is unbalanced compared to the upside (+3 health for every hit). Therefore, if you have it, equip it. It will give you the health boost that you need to survive a firefight. If you land an entire clip on someone, that's +150 health, which is a huge boost in a round.

Kritzkrieg (Second unlock, replaces the Medigun) - An extremely balanced support gun. Acts similarly to the medigun (except your Uber recharges 25% faster), but, when the charge is released, the recieving player gets crits for 10 seconds instead of invulnerability. This is a situational weapon: it's extremely good for defense when a team seems to be rushing, as it will kill a ton of players very quickly. However, despite how it may seem, it's not very good against sentry nests. You can die while recieving the charge, and therefore you have little time to let the crit blasts go.

Ubersaw (Third unlock, replaces the Bonesaw) - Again, a powerful upgrade. Gives you 33% Ubercharge per hit, which can also turn the tide of a round by giving you an Ubercharge quickly. I'd upgrade to this, even if the downsides (slower fire rate) make you wary.

Engineer

Engineers define the speed of pub play. A well placed sentry can halt an enemy attack, until a Demoman or a Spy comes along and takes you down. You also funnel people up to the front line with teleporters, and keep your team equipped with dispensers. A few good Engineers can defend a capture point by themselves, and can stop any chance of enemy victory in other styles of play.

GENERAL STRATEGY

Good sentry placement is how you stay alive. Give yourself a few vantage points on places enemies may cross, but keep it out of range of grenades launched by a demoman. For all intents and purposes of most games, your sentry is your weapon. Even if you have to go out, lure enemies to your sentry. There are a few reasons why this is a better strategy than using your shotgun or pistol:

1. Sentries never miss. We all are human. We all miss often, especially those of us (myself included) who have subpar PCs which lag a tad during combat. I trust a sentry's aim over mine, merely because it locks onto enemies.

2. Sentries, at level three, are rated to put out 8 bullets per second, along with rockets. Along with the knockback, this is enough to turn any enemy into a leaky piece of meat very quickly. The firepower of a level three sentry is unparalled in TF2.

3. It is difficult to kill a sentry, unless you are a demoman, if being shot by it. Beyond the psychology of the beep followed by the knockback, your aim and a short time to live make it difficult to kill a sentry. Even if they come close, a couple of knocks of the wrench should put it back up to speed.

A couple of concerns with sentries:

1. Don't place them at the end of long spaces. They do have a range, and a Scout could just whip out a pistol and take it out bit by bit if they get a shot at it.

2. Don't place them immediately around corners. Pyros can caddy-corner their flamethrower and burn it to the ground.

3. Don't stand in front of it. Your sentry can hurt you if it shoots at you. This is not true of your team.

4. Don't block anything important by it. You can't walk through your sentry, so don't use it to block off anything important to you. The enemy can't walk through it either, which can be used to your advantage as discussed later.

Dispensers will often make or break Arena rounds, and help greatly to yourself and others in rounds on other styles of play. On Arena, they give health, which a lack of healthpacks and difficulty in getting Medics to play make important. Elsewhere, they give ammo, which is needed by yourself for upgrading/repair, Soldiers and Demomen becuase they run out of ammo quickly, and other classes to bolster their ammo count.

Teleporters will often act as the deciding factor in CP push maps. The ability to get your team immediately to the front line gives you a distinct advantage in defense and offense. Put it somewhere useful, but not out in the open, as they can get shot and killed easily. If one teleporter in the pair gets destroyed, the other reverts to level one, so be careful.

As I alluded to before, buildings can block off entryways. This can be used to your advantage. Place a dispenser at the beginning of a hallway, and a sentry covering it. Even spies cannot get past it, which slows your opponents down dramatically. This is a good strategy if other Engineers have pragmatic dispensers already covered, giving ammo and health when needed.

TF2 Update News

Team Fortress 2

• Added a "Discard" button to the item pickup panel.
  
• Added a backstab custom death animation to the Heavy.
  
• Changed default for tf_arena_use_queue to 1. This was the original behavior prior to the last update.
  
• Changed the Dead Ringer so it can be activated while carrying the flag.
  
• Increased the Force-A-Nature's damage by 10%.
  
• Fixed not being able to reflect arrows with the Flamethrower.
  
• Fixed The Huntsman drawing a muzzle flash under lagged conditions.
  
• Fixed the background color of the Spy disguise panel not always matching his disguise team.
  
• Fixed idle players being kicked when the server has tf_arena_use_queue set to 0.
  
• Fixed Spies not being able to sap a building if an enemy player was colliding with the building.
  
• Fixed getting a real target ID on an enemy Spy that's disguised as one of your teammates if you are disguised as an enemy.
  
• Fixed the Ambassador not shooting enemy sticky bombs.
  
• Fixed Spies being able to automatically cloak after uncloaking at the moment of a weapon switch.
  
• Fixed Jarate instantly exploding when thrown in some places, like the final area of Badwater.
  
• Fixed spectators not having their items removed when they enter spectator mode.
  
• Fixed Sniper "civilian" exploit where players could crash the server.
  
• Fixed a couple of cases where viable backstabs would fail.

IMPORTANT:

1. FaN gets a buff. It now is a very useful weapon. I'm revising my original prognosis on this: if you're a hit-'n'-run player, use the weapon. Get two shots off on your enemy, run back, and keep doing it. This and the knockback will harass them enough to complete the scout's purpose.

2. They finally fixed backstabs failing, which has been harming my ability to play Spy effectively.

The rest seem to be general bugfixes. I've heard a lot of complaints about Jarate exploding in people's faces, so that being fixed is nice too.

Heavy

Heavy is easily a defensive powerhouse, and an offensive powerhouse if supported well. With a medic, he is unstoppable. His 300 health and minigun which can wipe any class out at point blank range make him the room-clearer of TF2, if it weren't for his speed. However, I would be out of a job which nobody hired me for and I don't get paid for if I couldn't tell you how to deal with that, so here we go!

GENERAL STRATEGY

Unlike the Demoman, your primary and your secondary have specific uses. The minigun is for storming rooms and defending points, while the shotgun is for mid-to-long range attacks.

The minigun does about 50 damage per shot at point blank range, so if anybody gets close, they're dead. The cone, however, makes its usefulness drop a ton. At mid range, it's difficlt to kill, and at long range, it's useless. To take advantage of this point blank power, however, one may adopt a Pyro-esque ambush strategy. This is especially true if not backed by a medic. Hide around a corner, and when some unlucky sap decides to try and attack you, destroy him with a spin of the minigun. Another strategy to take is to stand on a point, with your gun spun up. If they approach, they're dead, but they have to approach to take/defend the point. Either way, you win.

Spies love to backstab Heavies. They're slow, they often stand in one spot, and they have to peer in one direction while firing. The only way to counter this is to either a) have a Pyro spycheck all the time or b) keep turning around. Spies are the main check against you.

The Heavy-Medic pair is a force to be reckoned with. With 450 health, an Ubercharge every so often, and the minigun, you can clear a room easily. Make sure you defend the medic! Any player worth their salt will be gunning for the medic before you, so keep on the lookout for him. When Ubered, take out the shotgun and roll to whatever objective you're trying to take with the Uber, then pull out the minigun, spin up, and destroy.

UNLOCKS

Natascha - Don't use this. True, it may make killing Scouts somewhat easier, but -25% damage makes the gun useless at medium range. And since nobody good will try and beat you up close, you're dead with this gun.

Sandvich - Use this on Arena or if you have no medic / bad medics. Get to a place where you won't be found, and OM NOM NOM away. Gives you 140 health after 4 seconds, so you'll be healed up and ready to go in no time.

KGB - Melee is used so rarely in this class that this is somewhat inconsequential, but I use it just so that when I do end up trying to melee people to death, if I succeed, I can switch to the shotgun and crit some more people. If you do use this, try to catch somebody in isolation, KGB them, then take out your shotgun and storm a room full of enemies. This technique is extremely effective.

Demoman

TF2Wiki

A black Scottish cyclops, demoman's play is as eccentric as his nature. The role you play is fluid depending on the player, but there are enough constants and skills to focus on for a blogger such as myself to write on, which is what I am doing here.

GENERAL STRATEGY

You've got three weapons: a grenade launcher, a sticky launcher, and a bottle. Knowing when to use each weapon is what turns a bad demoman into one who is sitting here discussing it with you. Knowing the general strengths and weaknesses of each weapon allows you apply each to every situation, often on the fly. However, there are a few constants.

Based on the fact that you have relatively fast-moving explosive rounds (compared to the soldier), you're the preferred enemy of sentries. You can take them out long range if you're on a map with a lot of vertical space by simply arching your gun up (This, too, takes a lot of skill to figure out). What weapon you use depends on the situation. If you can't get a long range shot on it, roll around a corner, fire a sticky, go back, fire another, etc. When you have 2-3 near the sentry, blow it up. You should even be able to take out an engineer or nearby buildings with the blast as well, so a nice nest of stickies should blow open enemy defenses. However, at long range, stickies become less efficient. You can hold down Mouse 1 to have them shoot further, but that takes longer. It's simpler to arc grenades, which too have a blast radius large enough to take out a sentry nest.

Your defensive capabilities are also top notch. If you have 2 or 3 demomen on your team, you can essentially grind any offensive to a halt on a chokepoint (a tunnel, narrow corner, etc). Doing this requires a nest of stickies on the chokepoint, with constant spamming of nades. Demo spam is the TF2 version of suppressive fire (and, to a lesser extent, Heavy fire), and having 4 nades roll back towards an enemy offensive is enough to have them either a) killed or b)run away, let alone having 8 or 12.

However, you have a few weaknesses. First, the clip size and the amount of ammo you have for the grenade launcher are tiny. The gun decieves you with having six slots, as you can only fire four. Also, you carry a total of 20 grenades. Simply put, you will run out of ammo early and often. This means you should have a general awareness of where the metal is nearby, or go out and pick up enemy weapons after wiping out a wave. Moreover, you have very little mid-to-short range combat capability. You ahve a bottle, but that suffers from the same problems of any melee weapon, that is, you have to be right next to them for it to work.

Your main defensive strength, however, is laying traps. Stickies around a door, on a capture point, near the cart, etc. can stop either a scout trying to backcap or an entire round of offensive players. Don't get caught up in defending these traps, however. Although stickies can be knocked back, very few classes can do this, and if you see that a point is being taken, immediately right click to stop it.

It's difficult to write up individual class matchups due to the aforementioned mid-to-short range lack of capability, as that is where one-on-one matchups take place, but general strategy applies there. Stickies are easier to aim for stationary enemies, but grenades have a larger blast radius for faster ones. Overall, it's easiest to ask for a more combat-oriented class to help you out, as you can't kill anyone who comes near you.

Pyro

TF2Wiki

The most mysterious of the TF2 classes, the Pyro sports a full body, inflammable suit which obscures the gender, voice, and skin color of the Pyro. Though there are rumors about him/her (Handbag in his/her locker, for instance), nobody really knows the truth. For convenience, I will be sticking to the male pronoun instead of the speculative female and the bastardization of grammar that is the gender-free third person "they".

GENERAL STRATEGY

Strategy with the Pyro is relatively simple for beginners: you can be one ofthree Pyros, the infamous W+M1, the ambusher, or the defensive Pyro. All can be devestating if played correctly, but the foremost is hated by a lot of the community for lacking "skill". I personally disagree with that assesment, but I will posit that it is the least effective way to play.

W+M1, also referred to as the "charging pyro", consists of charging the enemy with your mouse button held down, lighting a few people on fire, dying, rinse, repeat. This can shut down an enemy offensive if there is either a) no medic or healthpacks or b) the majority is 125 health classes. However, these conditions are not met 90% of the time, and it will be completely inneffective. Don't specifically not use this tactic based on it's connotation within the TF2 community, specifically don't use it because it's not effective. If you find it to be effective, then use it.

The second style of Pyro play is the ambush. This can destroy a team if played correctly. This is a 3 step process:
1) Find a corner the team has to cross, or a hole in the wall for you to sit in.
2) Camp there
3) When they cross, light them on fire / kill them.
This can destroy a heavy/medic pair, and, with the backburner, kill 90% of classes. You essentially act as a less stealthy spy, hiding until someone crosses your path.

The third and final tatic for Pyros is that of playing defensively. Although this lends itself for CP games where you are either playing defense on an attack/defense map or holding on a push map, this also can be used to cover your rear on pushes. Essentially, your job is to a) spycheck, that is light everyone on fire until you find a spy, b) kill any stray enemies near you, and c) airblast enemies on fire and stray projectiles. You act as the counter to spies, other pyros, demomen, and soldiers. Considering those are effective offensive classes, you act as the backbone of the defense.

DON'T FORGET YOUR AIRBLAST! You can turn around projectiles, douse flames, and push back enemies with it. If you find that you are best at defensive pyroing, keep your original flamethrower equipped and airblast anything that seems fit. This eats up your ammo, so try and find some dropped weapons or metal boxes to give you something to shoot with.

SPECIFIC STRATEGIES VS. OTHER CLASSES

Scout - Once you light a Scout on fire, 90% of the time he will retreat. The lack of health coupled with lack of firepower means this fight is easily yours. If a Scout is picking you off from a distance, resist the urge to charge him as it will a) leave you vulnerable from the sides and behind and b) not work because of the Scout's speed.

Soldier - Airblast his rockets back at him. Again, resist the urge to charge him, as you will be less likely to reflect up close. Eventually, he'll get tired of not coming close to hitting you and back off.

Pyro - The most difficult fight in the game. Either use your shotgun or, if you have the flare gun equipped, the fire ax to kill him. Most of these fights are a crapshoot.

Demoman - Reflect everything he shoots at you back, but don't worry about charging if you're aware of his projectiles. These travel slow enough and arc whereby you won't have to worry about being hit if you know where they are.

Heavy - Probably the second most difficult class to kill. Get up close and light him on fire. This should be enough to confuse and disorient him, whereby you can either a) kill the medic attached to him or b) finish him off.

Engineer - If the engineer places his sentry around a corner, you can roll around the corner just slightly and still nto be detected, in which case you can flame the sentry to death. If a spy has sapped his buildings, airblast the engineer away to make sure he doesn't de-sap them.

Medic - Your flame can take out a medic relatively easily if you hit and run, thereby reducing his patient's ability to ward off your attacks. He will be forced to retreat, thus leaving his patient vulnerable.

Sniper - If you can get up close, you can airblast him out of his nest and into the combat zone, leaving him to die. Otherwise, relatively simple and easy to kill.

Spy - Spychecking is your job. Run around and flame everyone, and if a "teammate" catches on fire, proceed to let your team know and attempt to kill him.

UNLOCKS

Backburner (Second Unlock, replaces Flamethrower) - Good for ambushes, as you can easily take out people from behind. Otherwise, not effective, as airblast makes you a counter to demomen and soldiers, which adds another dimension to your attack or defense.

Flare Gun (First Unlock, replaces Shotgun) - This one is more controversial. This gives the pyro some long range capability, and allows for enemies a Pyro approaches to already be damaged when appraoching close range. However, this reduces your ability to kill Pyros to nearly zero. Use your own discretion on this one: if the other team's Pyros are effective, switch to shotgun. If not, then use this.

Axtinguisher (Third Unlock, replaces Fire Ax) - If you're either facing a team of effective Pyros or on a map with a significant underwater presence, then you should be using the fire ax. Otherwise, the axtinguisher acts as an effective end to either W+M1ing or ambushing.

Soldier

TF2Wiki

Soldier was rejected from every branch of the US army in World War 2, but that didn't stop him from killing nazis. No. The only thing that stops Soldier is an empty clip. Wielding a rocket launcher as a primary, a shotgun as a secondary, and a shovel as the melee weapon, soldier has plenty of short and long range destruction capability, with a few checks to worry about.

GENERAL STRATEGY

You are the second best way of destroying enemy Engineer's buildings. Keep in mind that sentries don't detect everything, just merely things within their sphere of detection, and stay far away and unload on them. You're the tiebreaker, with the ability to stop the stalemate caused by said sentries.

There are two major checks on you, however:

1. Clip size. You can roll through 4 rockets really quickly, and reload takes a while. This leaves you vulnerable. To compensate, switch to shotgun if in the heat of a combat situation and you run out of clip. When things cool down, switch back, and reload.

2. Slowness of your rockets. This doesn't matter for stationary targets, like Engineer's buildings, but for moving targets like actual enemies this makes long-range combat difficult, but not impossible. You can either anticipate his movements or place rockets in every possible direction of motion by him, thus giving him nowhere to run.

In terms of actual movement, though you are slower then average, your rocket jump makes up for that. To rocket jump, simply aim down and jump and shoot at the same time. This allows you to go to places that even Scout's double jump can't go, or, more preferrably, gives the enemy a nice surprise when you land amongst them and proceed to blow them all to smithereens. However, this technique hurts you a bit (as well as rocket blasts near your feet without actualyl rocket jumping), so be mindful of your health.

SPECIFIC STRATEGIES VS. OTHER CLASSES

Scout - Easily one of the most difficult to kill. A good scout will try to get you up close and move around a lot. Therefore, you should switch to your shotgun and pump him full of lead. Failing that, move backwards constantly and try and drag him into a rocket blast. Keep in mind that he has very little health, and two regular rockets (one crit) should take him out.l

Soldier - Shoot at his feet, and try and get close and move around a lot. You don't have much speed, so try and confuse him with your movements. When you get up close, pull out the shotgun and let him try and rocket you to death (and fail).

Pyro - If the pyro is W+M1 (That is, they constantly move forward and hold down the mouse button, hence the W (default bind is move forward) and M1 (Mouse 1, default bind is fire)), just shoot at where they will be when the rocket hits. 2-3 rockets should take him out. If you run into one around a corner, get out of range of his flamethrower and shoot rockets at his feet.

Demoman - Watch for sticky bombs, as you will have difficulty walking away from them due to reduced speed. Moreover, his grenade launcher will land a few more hits on you do to, again, your speed. Avoid his rounds and shoot at his feet.

Heavy - You were born to kill Heavies. Simply shoot constantly at his feet, and you will take out even a medic assisted heavy (Though, if a medic is assisting him, you should probably kill the medic first). Stay at long range, and his minigun's spray will reduce the amount of damage to you while his speed will make sure that your rockets will connect every time.

Engineer - You should be able to take out his sentry nest relatively quickly, with 2 or 3 rockets for a level 3. After that, storm his base, take out his dispenser, and kill him.

Medic - Again, I'd worry more about the patient then the medic, but always attack the medic first. This way, the patient has no source of health, making your job easier.

Sniper - You're also the best anti-sniper weapon (other than other Snipers). Unload 4 rockets on his "spot", and if he pops out for any of them, the jump caused by a hit will knock him out of there for either you to kill or somebody else on your team.

Spy - You're the third easiest target for the spy (Snipers are the easiest, followed by Heavies). If you suspect a spy is around, let your team know (either by pressing x followed by 2 or by telling them in voice chat), and constantly keep turning around. If you're lucky, he'll stab without getting a backstab, at which point, a few shotgun blasts should take him out.

Scout

TF2Wiki

I figure I'll start out the easy way: going down the classes, one by one. Let's start with the Scout.

The fastest class in the game, one must think fast in order to play him well. By "thinking fast", I don't mean thinking quickly, I mean thinking of tactics based on speed. He's the guerrilla fighter of TF2, and you have to think of him in this way in order to succeed.

Guerrilla is defined as "A member of an irregular, usually indigenous military or paramilitary unit operating in small bands in occupied territory to harass and undermine the enemy, as by surprise raids." We can ignore the first half of that definition and focus on the part about harassing. This must be your goal. You will need to engage in hit and run attacks, running to enemies, hitting, then getting the hell out. This sounds simple, but it's difficult in practice when you're inclination is to finish the job.

VERSUS OTHER CLASSES

Scout: These are usually a crap shoot, unless you manage to force the battle your way. The best way to do this is to fight the opposition into a smaller area, while you have room to maneuver. This is difficult, however, so it would be best to work your aim until he falls, runs away, or you get support from other team members.

Soldier: Easy to defeat, but often are labeled the worst enemy of the scout. To begin, realize that the rockets that the soldier shoots are very slow. In fact, the ability to jump in reaction should be relatively easy at mid or long range. For this reason, the large health of the soldier, and his speed, the pistol becomes a great addition to this fight. The ability to lop off 20 health per shot should reduce the health enough for one scattergun shot to take him out, or for the soldier to back off.

Pyro: The general strategy against pyro is the pistol from a distance. Because the pyro has no effective long-range weaponry, you have an immediate advantage if you keep it at mid-to-long range. If you end up at close range, and get caught on fire, run and find a medic. The afterburn is enough to lop off the majority of your health, and therefore any further confrontation is negative.

Demoman: Easy enough. Be aware of where the grenades land, and avoid those spots. The small clip of the demo and the slow movement of these shots should be enough for you to avoid them. Close combat with the scattergun is preferred because the demo only has his melee weapon to ward you off, which is always a random shot both with TF2's hit detection and your speed.

Heavy: Probably the most dangerous class to the scout, both based on health and weaponry. The Natascha can stop you dead in your tracks, and it's hard to get off 5 successful full-damage shots to take out the heavy, let alone with a medic aiding the heavy. If you approach a heavy-medic duo, try to take out the medic, then run out of there. Let your team deal with the remaining 450 health. Alone, you can pistol from a distance, then run up and scattergun. If you're really good, you can doublejump on top of the heavy's head, and bat him to death without him knowing where it is coming from. Overall, try to avoid at all costs.

Engineer: I wouldn't be worried about the man himself, but sentry guns are difficult to kill as a Scout. It requires long-distance pistoling or circle-strafing. You can outrun the turning of the sentry, but if you fail, you will get knocked back by the bullets of the sentry, slowing you down to a crawl, which then means you die. Overall, ask a spy or a soldier for help on sentry guns.

Medic: Easy to kill, a few scattergun shots should do it. Look out for the patient, however.

Sniper: Easiest class to kill. Just run up and get off two scattergun shots before he notices. If he does, you have to contend with the SMG most of the time (Unless the sniper has a razorback or jarate, in which case, you will be fine).

Spy: You are the second best spychecker. If a "teammate" stops you in your tracks, shoot him and let your team know that he is, indeed a spy. Otherwise, two scattergun shots shoudl take him out.

UNLOCKS

Force-A-Nature (First unlock, replaces scattergun):

Does about 95 damage (compare to 105 damage with the scattergun). 2 quick shots, then reloads. A few more bullets.

This is preferred when you're on a map where you're dealing with only one or two enemies at a time, depending on your playstyle. It's pretty simple to two-shot one enemy, but the constant reloads leave you vulnerable. Shoot, run, reload, then come back.

Bonk! Atomic Punch (Third unlock, replaces pistol):

Allows invulnerability for 5 seconds, with inability to shoot or do anything other than run. Gives a slight speed boost.

Unless you play a lot of 2Fort, where running past sentries is necessary. I wouldn't reccomend this. The pistol is too useful for mid-to-long range battles and whittling down of health of enemies that it shouldn't be replaced by anything (yet).

The Sandman (Second unlock, replaces bat):

Hits a ball that stuns enemies for a amount of time dependant on the distance hit from. Loses you your doublejump. During stun, only 50% damage done to enemies.

I wouldn't reccomend this, unless the extra support from the stunning is really needed, or snipers/spies need the opportunity (backstabs/headshots are still instant kills). The double jump is useful for evasion and harrasment that it should not be taken away from you.

Welcome!

I used to write a relatively personal blog (http://www.linkmandx.com, if you're wondering), and that wasn't working out. I had to (figuratively) beg people to come, and it wasn't fun after a while. I regrouped, and decided that I would write a blog about something I cared about, namely TF2. It's a great game, if you haven't played it.

I'm planning on an update a day (possibly more), with strategies, news, and whatever else I can think of.

*Disclamer: If you can't tell by the name, I'm not affiliated; a representative of; or in any way, shape, or form part of Valve Software.