Various Weapon and Class rebalance proposals. (Take 2)

[Bond]

I made a similar thread about a year ago. I decided to revisit these ideas and add some new ones, and remove/change some I've changed my mind on.

These are some balance ideas I've had for some of the classes and weapons that either annoy me or feel under/overpowered. I'll occasionally give a number like "-50%" or "+25%", but these are just me pulling numbers out of the air that sound right. Don't take those too seriously.

Is Valve actually gonna look at these? Probably not, though they have taken suggestions from forums in the past. This is mostly just for fun and to stir up a discussion.

Scout

Force-a-Nature

+ Alt-Fire: Fire non-explosive shell that has no knockback, but does 50% less damage per pellet
- Brief delay when firing an explosive shot after non-explosive shot (or vice versa)

The FaN is one of my favorite weapon designs in the game, but it is rather lackluster compared to stock. It's pretty powerful in some scenarios, but the knockback can be just as much of a hindrance as a boon in some situations. A good example of this is fighting an enemy soldier--you want to jump to avoid his rockets, but firing the weapon while jumping can effectively stun you in midair. Adding a non-explosive shot, even if much weaker overall, gives the FaN a little more flexibility, and makes it easier to use in situations where knockback is not desirable.

The damage penalty and delay are both there to reduce the burst damage potential--currently, the FaN has both high burst damage on meatshot and an extremely high rate of fire. It'd be very easy to insta-kill many classes if it weren't for the knockback acting as a sort of balancing mechanism, since the first shot will push the enemy away from you and thus reduce the damage of your second. Making the non-explosive shot do less damage should alleviate that, and the delay is there to stop the user from quickly following up a non-explosive shot with an explosive one, which might also do too much burst damage.

Baby Face's Blaster

+ Initial run speed penalty removed
+ Boost no longer decreases on jumps
Max possible speed same as before
- Boost now decreases on its own over time
- Retains -34% clip size penalty and boost reduction on damage taken

An idea to make the BFB less frustrating to play. You no longer start slower and there's no longer a penalty for jumping, which I think should make playing with the BFB less stressful. The downside now, however, is that boost decreases over time, so it's a much more temporary effect unless you can continue dishing out damage. I think I would also increase the damage needed to be done for max boost.

Crit-a-Cola

+ Remove Mark for Death penalty
+ Recharge is now only 10 seconds
- On drinking, player's next attack does minicrit damage. This disappears if not used in the next 5 seconds.

An attempt to make the CaC less penalizing but also less powerful. You can now only do a single mini-crit attack, and you have to use it almost right away. Scouts would have to consider when and where they can use it. To compensate, the debuff has been removed, and the recharge is only 10 seconds, so it should be less risky to use.

Mad Milk

On drink: Regenerate 64 health over 8 seconds
Alt-fire: Throw on a teammate to extinguish flames and clear Jarate. Throw on an enemy to make them wet (vulnerable to Pyro-sharks). If you hit them directly, deal ~5 damage (with the bottle), and cause a few ticks of bleed (because the glass cut them). Enemies soaked in milk will return 3 health to you or teammates per hit. This includes direct milk bottle hits and bleed
- Cannot drink if you have taken damage in the last 3 seconds
- Taking damage will cancel the regeneration effect

Current Mad Milk is frequently regarded as being overpowered, and one of the few weapons to be banned in every single competitive league. It gives your team a major advantage in team fights, and increases the Scout's effective health in DM for free. It's basically a Concheror buff you can get from your supply cabinet.

This rework turns it into what is effectively a medium health kit Scout can use in between battles. It'd be an alternative to looking for a med pack or retreating to a medic or dispenser.

It preserves part of the original identity (and it has to, because strange parts exist), but only in a much weakened fashion. However, if you can hit someone with the bottle directly, you can get a little bit of damage and some extra healing, but that's mostly for giggles. In my view, you'd use this more for drinking than for throwing unless you encounter a bunch of enemies grouped together.

Bonk! Atomic Punch

+ Player no longer goes into third-person perspective
+ Player can now attack during Bonk effect
- No longer grants invincibility
Instead, for a few seconds:
Range at which sentry guns can track you reduced by 70%
Gain immunity to airblast
Max damage you can take from a single blow is capped at 100

This one might be controversial...Bonk is no longer invincibility on demand. Instead, he gets a few buffs that should make it easier to attack in contested areas. The damage cap effectively renders the scout partially immune to sticky traps, headshots, and backstabs, but he'll still die to two rockets or two pipes. It gives Scout the ability to enter more chokey areas while still allowing him to get punished for overextending.

Pretty Boy's Pocket Pistol

+ Immunity to fall-damage while deployed
+ +33% Deploy Speed
+ Can now be used by Engineer
- -25% clip size
- No longer has faster firing speed bonus

This one is actually banned in 6v6. It's not hugely overpowered or anything, but the small downside and the heal on hit and faster firing speed amounts to basically being a straight buff for the scout compared to stock. This reworks it to be more like the old PBPP, but with a switch speed bonus rather than a health bonus. Fall damage immunity isn't a big deal on a Scout, but I imagine that it could allow Scouts to not save their second jump to break their fall, potentially allowing for some interesting movement. The real boon here is the switch speed, which is both there to facilitate the fall damage negation, as well to help combo it with primary.

The Sandman

+ Remove health penalty
- Slower movement speed when weapon is deployed
- Must be standing still to launch projectile

Passive debuffs basically kill any melee weapon on a class that does not rely on them. Instead, the penalty to the weapon should only really apply when the weapon is deployed. I think the slowdown on the Sandman is an okay effect (certainly better than the stun), and the standing still requirement should make it hard to spam.

Candy Cane

Now a Bat reskin

Sun-on-a-Stick

Now a Boston Basher reskin

These weapons are both garbage, and making them reskins would probably benefit the game more than reworking them into another dumb melee item.

Soldier

Cow Mangler

- No longer has infinite ammo

Infinite ammo on a rocket launcher is dumb.

Air Strike

Alt-Fire: Jump Blast--spend two reserve ammo (NOT loaded rockets) to create an explosion that can be used for blast jumping.
Clip size no longer increases on kills

Feeder weapons are bad, since on pubs you can just farm Gibusvison spies to become super-powerful, while against good players the benefits that come from kills will come more slowly and disappear more quickly. The feeder effect has been removed. To compensate, the weapon is given a means of rocket jumping without needing to actually fire a rocket--allowing you to save all your rockets for the actual attack.

Pyro

- Reflected projectiles can only damage the original sender, not his teammates

More of a quality of life change than a major nerf. I don't like the fact that a player can get punished because a dumb soldier on his team launched rockets at a good pyro. (I've been that bad soldier btw)

Phlogistinator

+ Can now airblast---MMMPH is rebound to Reload key
- Airblast reduces MMMPH meter
- Fire damage from flare guns fill MMMPH 50% slower

The phlog is far from most powerful weapon in the game, but it is probably one of the most annoying. I think most of the problems with it stem from flares--they give the Phlog Pyro a relatively risk free way of building MMMPH. I think reducing the effectiveness of that strategy (or maybe removing it altogether) would make the weapon a lot less annoying to deal with.

Mannmelter

+ Minicrit on burning enemies
- Extinguishing burning allies no longer grants crits

Killing another feeder weapon, and gave it combo minicrits to compensate. Not a super original upside, but I thought it needed something to compensate. Still probably not a great weapon.

Scorch Shot

- Projectile speed reduced by 60%

Maybe 60% is too much, idk, but I think a projectile speed reduction is the best option here. This would not only make it easier to dodge by the enemies, but it would also greatly reduce its effective range.

Sharpened Volcano Fragment

Now an Axetinguisher reskin

De facto removing another useless weapon from the game. I struggle to think of something useful to do with this weapon that would make a worthwhile alternative to the Powerjack or Axetinguisher.

Neon Annihilator

Third Degree

+ Damage removes sappers
+ Hitting a player removes all overheal from him
+ All players connected via Medigun or dispenser beams are hit
+ Crits against wet players
- -20% damage against players

That's right, the Neon Annihilator and Third Degree have been merged! I think it's a good way to make both weapons more viable and more interesting.

Demoman

Scottish Resistance

+ Arm time now 0.9 seconds (down from 1.5, still higher than Stock's 0.7)
- After arming, stickies have -15% damage and have a 15% smaller explosion radius. This penalty disappears after 0.6 seconds

This is just a straight buff to the current ScoRes. Right now, the ScoRes can actually work very well as a powerful area denial tool, but it fails at direct combat. Thing is, if all you need is area denial it makes more sense to just go Engineer. What makes the Sticky Launcher so great is its adaptability, and thus I believe the ScoRes needs to be buffed in direct combat in order to be a viable alternative to Stock. While the "true" arming time is still 1.5 seconds, stickies can now be detonated earlier with reduced effectiveness. This would make airbust stickies at least somewhat viable again, and theoretically a good Demo could make use of the ScoRes's faster firing rate to deal even higher DPS than Stock.

Quickiebomb Launcher

+ +1 clip size and active stickbombs out at once

Quickiebomb Launcher feels like a weapon that is almost good. I think simply increasing the amount stickies you can have out would put it in a decent place.

Eyelander

+ Removed -25 Max Health
+ Kills now heal 35 HP. Can overheal
+ Gain speed boost for 3 seconds on kill
- Remove permanent speed and health buffs to Demo for kills
- 100% slower deploy speed
- 50% slower holster speed

This isn't really a super needed change, I just dislike feeder weapons on principle. It kinda still is one, but the effect is much more temporary and it's harder for a demoknight to become a tank by feeding on F2P noobs. The lack of a health penalty means the Eyelander can now be plausibly used in non-Demoknight loadouts.

Ullapool Caber

+ Remove slower deploy speed
Primary fire no longer explodes and does normal damage instead.
Instead, when you hit the reload key, the Demoman primes the grenade (somehow) and the weapon starts glowing. It explodes after ~1.5 seconds. Cannot holster during this period.
If you hit an enemy right as the grenade explodes, the explosion minicrits and you get a Double Donk effect.

A buff to make the Ullapool stronger and more fun, but in a more skill indexed way. This is the idea I am proudest of.

Heavy

+ Now has a seperate "Lunchbox" slot, allowing him to use both a food item and shotgun at the same time (a suggestion I've seen a lot, and one that I like)
+ Almost every minigun now has an alternate firing mode. Change firing mode by pressing "Reload" while minigun is selected. Mode cannot be changed while firing unless specified
Thrown lunchbox items will disappear when picked up by an enemy, but will no longer heal them (to reduce griefing potential)

Heavy is the currently the most simplistic class in the game. He's mostly balanced the way he is now, but he is not very interesting to play. Goal here is to alleviate that a bit by giving him more tools to work with and increasing his design space. The only minigun that does not get an alt-mode is Tomislav, which is basically the current best minigun right now, making this a stealth nerf. (Tomislav's new main upside is its lack of noise when revved up)

Minigun

Alternate Firing Mode: Reduced rate of fire, reduced spin up/down time, increased movement speed, increased accuracy

Press "R" to turn Stock into Tomislav, basically. No percentages since I have no idea what would actually work here in a balanced fashion. The stock minigun should have the simplest and easiest to understand alternate-firing mode, IMO.

Natascha

Default Firing Mode: Same as Stock's default, no slowdown effect on bullets
Alternate Firing Mode: Bullets slow down enemies, deal 50% less damage per bullet, consumes ammo twice as fast, slower spin up time

A way to hopefully make Natascha less obnoxious. This makes the slowdown effect deals less damage and is thus much more situational, but weapon stays viable by virtue of the fact that its default mode is the same as Stock.

While this seems like a straight buff, this should be taken with the changes I made to the minigun up above.

Brass Beast

Default Firing Mode: Same as current Brass Beast
Alternate Firing Mode: Berserker Mode! Movement speed and spin up time now same as stock, damage resistance removed, max health drains while firing (similar to GRU).

Alterate firing modes allows for the possibility of riskier and situational effects. A max health drain on a minigun would kill the weapon normally, but if it's something you can toggle on and off, that's a different story. This change allows a Brass Beast Heavy to switch between "human sentry" and "glass cannon".

Huo Long Heater

Default Firing Mode: Same as Stock's default, no fire or bonus against burning players
Alternate Firing Mode: toggles the flame effect, ammo consumption increase, and bonus against burning players
+ 10% damage penalty removed

While this seems like a straight buff, this should be taken with the changes I made to the minigun up above.

Buffalo Steak Sandvich

+ Can now use shotguns under steak effect.
- Shotguns do not gain minicrits
- -150 Max Health during duration of Steak effect. Health gradually restores after effect ends

Fat Scout is now real! I think this would actually be interesting, since it'd give Heavy a good way to get to the front lines faster without leaving him completely defenseless. Given this buff, it'd make it an interesting alternative to the GRU, since using the Steak for traversal would be viable, freeing up the melee slot for the Fists of Steel, for example. For that reason, I thought it'd be appropriate for it to have the same penalty as the GRU.

[Bond]

Engineer

+ Engineer now takes 50% less damage from his own sentry guns
+ Base sentry health increased by 33%
- Co-operative Engineering removed entirely--engineers cannot speed up, upgrade, repair, or remove sappers from each other's buildings

First two buffs are there to compensate for the Wrangler nerf. I do honestly think that sentries are just a touch too fragile at the moment. The third is Uncle Dane's suggestion, and I agree with it entirely. Even without co-op engineering Engineer stacking remains incredibly powerful, but removing the co-op elements would at least make individual Engineer/Sentry picks more meaningful.

Frontier Justice

+ Upon destruction of a completed sentry gun by an enemy, gain a few seconds of minicrits
= Duration of minicrit effect depends on level of sentry destroyed (LVL 3 > 2 > 1 > Mini)
- -50% clip size

Again, I don't like feeder weapons, and stored crits are problematic as well. This I think maintains the spirit of the original weapon, but makes it less dependant on noob scouts running into your sentry gun. Note that the sentry has to be completed, so you can't just start building a sentry in front of an enemy and give yourself minicrits upon its immediate destruction.

Rescue Ranger

- Cannot teleport buildings that have taken damage in the last 2 seconds
- Repair now heals over time instead of burst. Healing canceled if it takes damage

Simple enough nerf. This should make tanking damage with the RR when the sentry is under active attack less viable.

Wrangler

+ 33% faster deploy speed
+ 33% faster holster speed
+ Sentries no longer become disabled after unwrangling
- Remove Shield entirely

Self-explanatory. I do think that since the shield is gone, the weapon does become harder to use, so I think it may be worthwhile to give it a few buffs to encourage engies to wrangle and unwrangle their sentries more freely.

Short Circuit

Alt-fire reworked entirely--no longer deletes projectiles at all. Instead, enemies hit by it will have ~20% of their reserve ammo decreased. A percentage of the ammo will be returned to the Engineer.
- Cannot receive ammo from any other source while deployed

The Short Circuit is incredibly cheap and annoying right now. It's way too easy to spam and deny demos and soldiers right now. This change still makes a formidable tool against projectile classes, but in a less cheap way. The ammo return also gives it some synergy with the Widowmaker.

The Jag

- -25% Sentry Health

The Eureka Effect

+ Remove metal pickup penalty
- Cannot build boost pads
- -25% Sentry Health

The first change, when combined with the 33% base sentry health bonus, means that the Jag remains exactly as it is now. The Eureka Effect actually gets buffed here, since its sentry health remains the same, but it gets rid of that annoying metal pickup penalty.

Medic

Vaccinator

+ +1 Extra Ubercharge (5 instead of the current 4)
- Charge must 100% before you can use Uber
- Uber will not rebuild until all charges are used

The point of the Ubercharge is to be a stalemate breaker, a powerful tool that allows you to break through even the toughest of defenses. The current Vaccinator design violates this idea by giving you many smaller ubers that are often too weak to break through a good defense but strong enough to defend against an opposing push--in other words, a tool that prolongs stalemates instead of breaking them. The new design is there to encourage using all of your ubers at once, using them more coordinated team pushes rather than a self-preservation tool you can spam at any moment.

Quick Fix

New uber design: Now have three(possibly more) smaller ubers. Ubers create a healing bubble around the player that persists for ~3 seconds, even after the medic detaches his beam. Bubbles have the same heal rate as the QF.
- Charge must 100% before you can use Uber
- Uber will not rebuild until all charges are used

I don't really like the current quick-fix uber because it's too similar in function to the stock uber, just weaker. The problem with it is that scales poorly with team size. If you are playing on a sparsely populated server, the Quick Fix is arguably superior to a stock uber in most instances, simply because the higher rate of healing may as well be invincibility, with crits, snipers, and sticky-traps being the only real weaknesses. It only becomes much weaker on larger servers where there are many sources of damage.

The new design is there to give it a unique playstyle compared to stock. Much like my Vaccinator rework, it's there more to encourage pushes that use several teammates instead of a single pocket.

Sniper

- All rifles now have a thin laser emanating out from them to show what the Sniper's sightlines are. (Inspiration)

Obviously not my idea, see linked video.

Sydney Sleeper

+ While deployed and scoped: Headshots from enemy snipers only deal mini-crit damage to you
- Removed faster charge rate

The increased charge rate on this weapon is kinda dumb, is overpowered in 6v6, and acts as a sort of a crutch in casual. This should make the weapon a bit more fair to fight, IMO. I think Jarate on hit is already a pretty powerful upside on its own. Instead, I give a semi-passive updside the partially negates having the downside of not being able to headshot.

Bazaar Bargain

+ Charge no longer depletes entirely when unscoping. Instead, it will slowly drain when unscoped, faster if you move
+ Hits no longer deplete your charge - Head shots reduce your existing charge by 50%, body shots/noscopes by 80%
+ While maximum damage is the same as stock, noscopes and quickscopes have 10% damage penalty
- -20% slower charging speed

Again, I don't like feeder weapons. I wanted to preserve the aspect where playing well and consistently gives you more of an advantage. However, the new design puts a cap on how quickly the sniper can fire powerful shots. A well positioned sniper that had been guarding a sightline for a while can get maybe 2 or 3 more charged shots more quickly, but afterwards the weapon becomes a liability compared to other snipers.

Machina

+ Shots can penetrate multiple enemies at all charge levels
- Each subsequent penetration does -66% potential damage
- Remove +15% body-shot bonus
- Cannot Fire Unless Zoomed In

The Machina is one of the few weapons banned from every league, and for good reason. The current downsides are pretty insignificant for good snipers, while the penetration and extra body shot damage amounts to a straight up buff for a class that doesn't need one. I think it'd be best to rework the weapon to emphasize the most unique aspect of the weapon--the penetration--without making the effect too punishing. A small downside for a small upside is fair, I think.

The Classic

+ Laser pointer only shows up at full charge level, or when scoped
+ Headshots when not fully charged deal mini-crit damage

The Classic needs something to make it more useful. This balance proposal only works with a change to the sniper's laser--making this a more stealthy alternative.

Jarate

- Player does not start with Jarate ready
- Jarate can no longer be refilled in spawn cabinets, and does not charge during startup
- Splash radius reduced by 50%

Jarate is also one of the few weapons banned in every league. As it turns out, giving players an easily spammable tool to give your team free minicrits is actually kind of powerful and obnoxious. This rework makes it behave more like the Gas Passer, and along with the reduced splash radius means its meant work more like a tool to save the sniper in close quarters engagements instead of being a cheap Buff Banner. It's now a proper alternative to the SMG--an option to help in close quarters combat.

Darwin's Danger Shield

- Charge rate 10% slower

This thing needs another downside. Alternatively, just make it a +25 HP weapon again. That was fine.

Spy

Enforcer

+ Shots do 20% more damage from the back (stacks with disguised bonus)

I like the idea of emphasizing Spy's assassination theme by turning this revolver a into long-range knive, so to speak.

Ambassador

+ Crit falloff removed
- Slight random weapon spread that would only be noticeable at longer ranges.

I think Valve's original proposed nerf the Amby was better and would have kept the weapon more viable.

Diamondback

Charged Shots: Players can hold down the left mouse button to charge a shot. Charged shots do more damage and can briefly slow the enemy down
- Charging a shot drains cloak meter
- No longer gain crits on destroyed buildings or backstabs

One of the worst designed weapons in the game. It's a stored-crits feeder weapon whose strength increases if the enemy dares to use an Engineer on their team, and is a frequently banned weapon. The rework throws the original concept out the window, and goes for a design inspired by the Widowmaker--Spy can trade cloak for increased damage (I would cap it at 90 damage for 50% cloak, but exact numbers would require playtesting).

Red Tape Recorder

+ Drains sentries of ammo and dispensers of metal.

I saw this idea somewhere and I felt like its the simplest buff you could give it without really ruining the theme of the weapon. Anything to make this slightly more useful.

Multi-class

Pain Train

+ Retains capture speed bonus
+ Can now be used Sniper, Heavy, and Pyro
+ Removed: 10% extra damage from bullets
+ Gain 25% speed boost when carrying intelligence
+ Melee hits deal crits to enemies who are carrying your intelligence
+ Melee deals mini-crits when you are near a point (regardless if you are trying to capture an enemy's point or defending your own) or holding the enemy intelligence
- Speed and capture boosts only apply when weapon is deployed
- GRU-style health drain when weapon is deployed for more than 3 seconds, down to 60% of your base health (maybe, only if it becomes a problem on demoknights)

The Pain Train isn't a bad weapon as it is, but I think it's overly situational. It's worse than useless in certain gamemodes, like CTF, or when you are defending. I removed the passive debuff so that it's not punishing players who forget they have it equipped, with the tradeoff being that the weapon now needs to be deployed for its benefits to activate. These changes give it a purpose when playing defense or CTF. The health drain I'm iffy on--it's mostly because I am worried about this weapon in the hands of demoknights.

[Bond]

New Weapons

New Sticky Bomb Launcher (The Trap Master)

+ Automatic reload turned on for this weapon regardless of player's auto reload settings
- Stickies have a ramp up similar to stock, but then also have a ramp down after a few moments on the field to about 85% of base damage.
Sticky Groups: Pressing the Reload key will now instead switch between 3 different Sticky Groups. Primary fire will launch a sticky and assign it to the currently selected group. Alt-fire will detonate all stickies in currently selected group. Can have 4 stickies per group.

Though this is a trap focused weapon, I keep the initial damage high and then ramp it down. This is compensated by the fact the weapon allows more stickies on the field than stock.

New Heavy Lunchbox Item (The Molar Breaker)

+ Heal 100 HP
+ For 15 seconds, max damage you can receive in a single blow is capped to 200
Recharge of 15 seconds

Something similar to my Bonk rework, but for Heavy. Basically acts as a soft counter for spies, snipers, and sticky traps. I'd like it'd to be a piece of hard tack[en.wikipedia.org], because hard bread makes for hard men.

New Pyro Flamethrower

Longer range than current flamethrower
Hitscan based, no particles
Damage ramps up the longer you can consistantly track your target. Ramp up resets if lose track even for a moment.
Afterburn applies 50% slower than regular flamethrowers

It's a lightning gun for Pyro. I didn't put that much thought into this, just threw what I sounded right. I wanted it to reward players for consistantly tracking an enemy. Visually, I'd imagine it be some sort of stream of plasma.

New Demoman Melee (The Flying Scotsman)

+ While deployed: take 50% less self-damage
+ Immunity to fall damage
- 15% slower deploy speed
- 50% slower holster speed
- Cannot holster while airborne

Demo is the only class without a utility melee. I wanted to give him something to use besides pans, hams, and bottles, but I didn't want him to give him something that'd be always useful (he's already a pretty powerful class). The item won't be too useful in initial rollouts for that reason, but I do think a good demo might find some use out of it.

New Spy Knife (The Nightshade)

Press Reload to apply poison to knife
Poison regenerates after 20 seconds after backstabbing with it.
Poisoned stabs don't break disguise, but don't instantly kill the target. Target will die 5 seconds later.
Unpoisoned knife works like stock.
- Upon backstab, target will be able to pick up health kits even at full health. Death will not take place if target is healed by any source.
- -10% movement speed.

Idea is for a delayed death. You can walk up to someone, backstab, then walk away before someone notices. When they die, the idea is that you will be much further away (this could mess with killcams though)

New Sticky Bomb Launcher (The Smart Bomber)

+ Player gets an audible beep and a HUD indicator when an enemy is in range of one of his traps
- -2 clip size and active stickies

Pretty straightforward. You can now place traps, and when an enemy gets in range, you get notified. In exhange you have fewer stickies to work with. Otherwise, it's identical to stock.

New Heavy Minigun (Rasputin's Revenge)

3 different modes--Bullet, Explosive, Fire.
Heavy can press reload to switch between them. Cannot switch while spun up.
When heavy takes damage from selected source, Revenge meter builds.
The higher the revenge meter is, the higher the firing speed (up to 20% or so).
Revenge meter decreases over time.

Basically, Heavy tries to predict which damage source he will be facing, and switches to that mode. If he makes the correct choice, he will be rewarded with extra damage. If not, it's just a stock minigun (this is assuming my suggested alternate firing mode buff for Stock is implemented.)

New Engineer Pistol (The Point and Brand)

Fires a projectile similar to the Rescue Ranger
Sentry will immediately turn towards the projectile and track it for a few seconds
If projectile hits enemy, sentry will prioritize that enemy
4 rounds per mag

A sort of pseudo-Wrangler. You can either use this when you anticipate an enemy is coming, so that the Sentry is facing towards the direction of the anticipated entrance, or when there are multiple enemies, so that you can prioritize key targets (for example, telling it to ignore ubers)

New Engineer Wrench (The Galvanized Goliath)

+ 50% base health on buildings
- Requires 300 metal to upgrade buildings
- 20% slower swing speed
- Buildings are 70% larger
- Cannot haul level 2 or 3 sentries

Get super tanky but slow to build up sentries. I felt with a Wrangler nerf, the Engi could use some option to increase the life of his sentries, since they can be quite fragile most of the time. While the primary intention would be for long defenses, this could also be used by battle engies to build some tankier level 1s relatively quickly. They are also larger in size, making them easier targets to hit. This item would only be acceptable in the case of a Wrangler nerf and Engi co-op removal.

New Engineer Wrench (The Ohm-ni Tool)

Press Reload to switch to switch between Wrench and Shield mode.
In Wrench mode, acts as a normal wrench
In shield mode, you can't repair or upgrade. Instead, hitting buildings grants them a damage resistance shield (similar to what the Wrangler has right now)
Wrench has a charge meter that depletes on shielding and recharges over time. Respawn cabinet does not replenish.
Shields on buildings also deplete over time (faster than the wrench recharges)
- -10% base Sentry health

Basically, the Wrangler shield is moved to its own item, but to a wrench rather than to a secondary. I think it'd be more balanced than the current Wrangler shield, since it'd mean forgoing the Jag or the Gunslinger, and because the shield is temporary, resource based, and requires the engi to actually be near the sentry to shield it.

New Spy Sapper Replacement (The Secret Sensor)

Primary fire places sensor on any compatible surface (same logic as a Sticky bomb). Sensor will beep (audible only to you) everytime someone walks past it, with different tone depending on detected class. Shows "wallhack" sillouhette of that player to your entire team for as long as enemy stays by sensor. Sensor is invisible to enemies, but will be destroyed if it takes any damage from enemy (like from splash damage from an enemy rocket). Placing another sensor will remove current one.

I think as far as direct Sapper replacements go the Red Tape Recorder is the best we are going to get, so I think the best thing to do is to experiment with other utilities. This would be a tool for providing intel to your team. It's range is fairly limited (the enemy has to be standing right next to it for the wallhack to happen), and it will be destroyed by even the slightest amount of splash damage, so proper placement will be important.

New Spy Sapper Replacement (The Waypoint Warper)

Primary fire places waypoint on the ground. Pressing fire again will play a brief animation and teleport you to that waypoint. Press reload to destroy current waypoint.
- Must be undisguised and uncloaked to teleport
- Teleporting drains some cloak and has a cooldown
- Taking damage during animation will interrupt the teleport
- Waypoints are visible to enemies and can be destroyed by them. They also have an indicator that flashes when you are trying to teleport. You will die if waypoint gets destroyed while attempting to teleport.

Not sure about this one, but I think it sounds fun at least. It's the Eureka Effect, but for Spy. It could be used either as an escape tool to teleport you back to your team, or as a flank tool to teleport you behind enemy lines. The animation and undisguised requirement should make it difficult for a Spy to use this too easily.

New Demoman Grenade Launcher (The Bouncing Bombard)

Grenades have a lot more bounce to them.
Grenades have no random spin when fired
Grenades can only travel along two axes (can't roll left or right, will go forward and up and down)
+ Grenades will still explode on direct hits even after a bounce. Direct hits do -10% damage for every bounce
- 20% longer detonation time
- 20% slower projectiles

To picture what I have in mind, throw a rubber superball forward. That's basically how I picture the grenades would travel.

New Soldier Rocket Launcher (The Homer)

Can slightly steer rocket with your crosshair
- Can have only 1 rocket in the air at a time

A kind of rocket launcher analog of the Scottish Resistance. Think Half-Life 2 rocket launcher. Your rocket launcher, while in the air, will gently turn towards the direction of your crosshair. You can use this to adjust your aim slightly after launching a rocket. It won't be of much use at close ranges since the rocket will explode before you can do any meaningful adjustment, and at long ranges its limited by effectively slowing down your firing speed. At medium ranges, however, a skilled player could try to use the homing to adjust for any unpredicted movements the enemy made to maximize splash.

New Soldier Rocket Launcher (The Prime Directive)

Upon hitting primary fire, a rocket will be primed for firing. The rocket will fire automatically 0.7 seconds after priming.
Can prime multiple rockets at once. Max firing speed is the same as stock
+ 40% faster projectile speed

This is kind of a weird one and I'm not sure I'm explaining what I have in mind properly, but here goes nothing. The idea is that you get a rocket launcher with much faster projectiles...at the cost of an overall slower firing speed if you're firing rockets one at a time. However, if you prime multiple rockets at once, they will come out at the same interval as stock. So, if you prime all four of your rockets at once, the first rocket will still come out 0.7 seconds slower, but the other 3 will come out at the normal rate.

----

Feedback? This was largely just for fun. Some of these people are obviously gonna dislike, but I'd like to know if any of these ideas actually sound interesting.

[Gnome Truther]

"Alt-Fire: Fire non-explosive shell that has no knockback, but does 50% less damage per pellet"
The very first suggestion and you've already lost me.

[Joke Train]

Originally posted by Bond:

Sydney Sleeper

[...] is overpowered in 6v6

LMFAO

[Bond]

Originally posted by Joke Train:

Originally posted by Bond:

Sydney Sleeper

[...] is overpowered in 6v6

LMFAO

Unless something's changed recently, the weapon is banned in 6v6. Or at least, it's been banned in the past. Usually the sniper's job in a 6v6 match is to get a body-shot on the medic, and the Sleeper is probably the best weapon for that.

[Joke Train]

Originally posted by Bond:

Unless something's changed recently, the weapon is banned in 6v6. Or at least, it's been banned in the past.

It's 6s, they banned Machina literally just because it looks and sounds more powerful than stock lol

Usually the sniper's job in a 6v6 match is to get a body-shot on the medic, and the Sleeper is probably the best weapon for that.

Just shoot him in the head to instantly kill him instead of waiting around for almost a twentieth of a minute lmao

[Eighteen-Counts Trevor]

You could have made this a google document

Also your rebalance thread could do without completely new weapons

[Spartykins]

all the classic needs is airborne firing

nothing more nothing less

[Graceful Jabberwocky]

Originally posted by Bond:

Wrangler

+
+
+

Alright that's all I need to see

[Bond]

Originally posted by gaceful jabocy:

Originally posted by Bond:

Wrangler

+
+
+

Alright that's all I need to see

I literally suggest removing the most problematic part--the shield--entirely. The buffs are just there to compensate for the fact that a Wrangler without a shield would be a weapon that is more risky to use, because the Engineer likely has to expose himself and his sentry to more danger to Wrangle a sentry for the purpose of actually aiming it.

[Ellie ⁠≧⁠▽⁠≦]

WE CAN FINALLY DRINK THE MAD MILK THANK YOU