How to Properly Play the Medic

The medic is among the most important perks in the game, without him you are at a major disadvantage. But how do you play the medic? How do you get him to level quickly and still support your team? What guns should a medic use? This guide will help you start out being a proper medic so you don't wind up being the medic carrying a flamethrower.

Introduction

Welcome to the guide on How To Properly Play The Medic.
In this you will learn:
1.The Do's and Don'ts of Being a Medic
2.What Becoming a Medic Entails
3.Small Strategy Tips
4.How to Keep Everyone Alive, and Survive.
5.How Thankless of a Job This is

Alright, first thing's first. Why does anyone want to be a Medic? Well, a Medic in Killing Floor is the team's life and blood. We bounce around everyone making sure they are above "injured" before we even think about killing the zeds. So no, there isn't a whole lot of appeal unless you love to support your team in games like this.


But, to those who do like to support your team, this is as good as it gets, folks.

Medics: The Do's and Don'ts

Let's go through a list of what you shouldn't do as a Medic. Pay attention. This part is important as it will save you a lot of stress in the field so your team won't vent at you.
Don'ts
Do NOT grab weapons that are insanely unnecessary, such as a flamethrower.
Do NOT get in the middle of the fight unless you're trying to be a hero. More on that later.
Do NOT say hi to the Fleshpounds. Your team is a weapon. Use them as such, and polish them regularly.
Do NOT be afraid to get bossy with your team. If someone refuses to buy armor, give them the money. More on that later.
Do NOT block a Berserker's escape route. More on that later.
Do's
DO save a cornered teammate with everything you have left, the team comes before you.
DO communicate with your team.
DO supply your team with weapons, armor, and cash, you will make a lot of money in the field and you only really need a few things.
DO keep tabs on your teams location and their health via the scoreboard. More on that later.
DO inform your team you are switching off medic before doing so if you want to switch to another perk.
DO put the pressure where you think it's needed, but don't forget your team comes before the zeds.

On to the next section.

Weapons

Now on to the fun stuff!
GUNS

But first, your best friend, Body Armor.
This can and will save your life time and time again. If you can't afford a medic gun and body armor, forget the gun, and take the armor. This will get you in and out of hell with 5 guys begging you to save them. Best feeling in the world, and it's cheap.

The Healing Syringe is your bread and butter. It does more healing points on your teammates than a medic gun dart at the cost of speed. The only times you shouldn't use this over your medic gun darts is when you need firepower to save a teammate along with healing them, you are in a rush to heal the next guy, or you are too far away to use the syringe. Remember, everyone has this. If someone is healing themselves and they are at 99 hp, use common sense and heal the guy dealing with the Scrake first.


The MP7M Medic Gun should be the second thing you buy after body armor. It's certainly not the best medic gun, but it will save your teammates in a bind and the firing rate is good for crowd clot control.

The next two guns are essentially the same thing with minor differences, try them out to see what works best. If you want to see the numbers, refer to this wiki page on the KF wiki. http://kf-wiki.com/wiki/Medic


The MP5M and Schneidzekk medic guns are tier 2 medic guns that are very similar in their stats, they both have better stopping power than the MP7M but with a lower fire rate and a smaller magazine size, this is better against the toughies while still maintaining the crowd control effect.

On to our last weapons, the Medic Grenade and the M7A3 Medic Gun.
The Medic's grenade is an amazing asset to everyone (excluding the nasty specimens) because it heals allies and damages specimens. Use this on clumps of players or berserkers, and they will be happy you're there, whether they admit it or not. Make sure you inform players it heals them and is not some sort of specimen damage type.


Finally, my favorite gun. This is the tier 3 medic gun known as the M7A3. This gun has 15-30 rounds a magazine, and deals the most damage out of all of the medic guns. This is a great weapon to keep all sorts of specimens away from the team. A good all-around weapon.

Tactics

On to tactics. I'll be using screenshots for this section. If you recognize your screenshot in here, inform me and I'll refer you.

First: The Scoreboard
This baby will save lives. If you see yellow next to a name, you're doing it wrong. If you see someone with even a sliver of white in that health bar, you come running. Check the scoreboard frequently.

Second: Keeping Berserkers Alive
It's a common misconception that Medics and Berserkers don't get along. This is only partially true. See, Medics and Berserkers have issues together because the Medic hangs back while the Berserker stays at the front taking a face full of heat while the Medics support him. If the Medic ♥♥♥♥♥ up, though, the Berserker and Medic will start to argue. Let me give a few pointers on how not to let this happen.
1. Stay out of their immediate escape route. Notice on this picture above that the Berserker is attempting to retreat but the two Medics are blocking his path. If you do this while he is running from a Fleshpound, he won't be able to get away because you are trapping him. Stand to the 'zerker's left or right while you heal him.
2. Use your medic grenades
3. Communicate!

Third: Being Alone
It's easy to get separated as a Medic and be cornered by zeds. You can prevent this by doing these things.
1. Always keep your team in your cone of vision. If they all move somewhere, so do you.
2. If you can't see everyone in your vision, rely on the buddy system. Single out the team members you can see and stick with them.
3. Communicate!

Fourth and Final: Nagging Your Team and Healing them at the Trader.

Always check on the team, but triple check when it's Trader time. Heal EVERYTHING. Even if they look like they have a bruise, heal them. Make sure you ask your team to heal up any damage you didn't right before the wave starts.
Always nag the team if they don't buy armor. They will hate you for this, but in the end, everyone will be happy they got it. If they say it is because they could not afford armor, give them the money. Don't worry, you make money just by healing your team and if you follow what I have told you about healing you will have money coming out of your ears.

Just How Thankless Is This?

"Going medic for Patriarch, waiting for everyone else to damage him, take aggro and die whilst u do nothing, then kiting him thru the level for 10 mins does not make u a good player.
If you just went support/demo/sharpshooter and did something useful in the beginning the world wouldn't have to watch as u run around alone pretending ur awesome. Ur only alive because u can't do enough damage to register to the Pat."

Becoming a medic means this to you:
1. Kills are no longer important.
2. You are expendable in later parts of a wave.
3. Money is no object.
4. People won't thank you for saving their ass 8 times.

If you ♥♥♥♥ up, you can be blamed for kiling the whole team, unlike a Sharpshooter who can die with no setback but money and weapons.

People are stupid. They will mess you up, then blame you for it.
Like this, you will be locked out all the time, but this isn't just Medic specific.

Sometimes though you'll get thanked for saving the team, and when you do you'll feel awesome.

Thanks for reading the guide. If I got something wrong, contact me and I will fix it ASAP. Hope this guide helped.

[Haunt]

Most medics tend to carry the Schneidzekk on higher difficulties, with the MP5 being a poor man's version due to the lower weight and faster charge. They also slow you down less during kites and allow you to carry bigger guns for support, like a hunting shotgun and a machete if you want to go for the good ol' pro Medic uppercut. You could also carry both those guns to be able to dish out non-stop heals in a hold situation, and still have the space for a trenchgun so that you might have some literal firepower.

So yeah, I get that your preference lies on the M7A3, but the consensus is that the Schnedzekk is the best option on higher difficulties.

Of course, if you've gotten to level 6 Medic and you still don't get what's in this guide, what's even the point really.

[DreadPirateFury]

@ Cody Larkin You have to apply mayonnaise to your nipples and sing your countries anthem. It will buff your healing stick.

[Cody Larkin]

Got moist as medic. Need help. I'm dieing.

[Hunster]

This guide is.. well, lacking. You only focus on communication, while an important part of the game, you don't specify WHAT to do as a medic. And the latter half of this is pretty much a slap on the wrist if a medic decides to get a melee weapon just in case they think ♥♥♥♥'s going ot hit the fan.

[DunkinSPE]

Suggestions for Addition to your Guide:

Add

Step 1. Buy a Microphone & Setup in game communication.
Step 2. Use Mic in game to call out Higher Tier Zed locations & Direct Teammates.

Suggested Loadouts Section (based on level & wave):
For example
Normal: MK23, MP5M, & XBow(For waves 5 & higher)
Hard: MK23, M7A3, & Fire Axe
(Obviously these loadouts can vary on team makeup and personal play style)

Patriarch Guide as Medic:

Focus on your role vs the teams. If you have an veteran team this shouldn't be hard as your main goal is healing and possibly doing a block jump if the Patriarch attempts his lunge attack on a fellow teammate to take the hit.

Have more but hit the character limit....

[iLike Crayon]

TDC DarkShadow6: Those points make sense unless you're playing suicidal/HoE, it's always best to keep yourself healed, also, a lot of players have a strategy for self healing which instead of waiting the 10 seconds it takes to heal, you only have to wait a mere second, basically all you do is re-bind your switch to knife key to the same heal as self heal, and press it three times it will instantly heal you and then bring out the knife so your wait time is only a second or two.

[Kav]

Great guide, thanks for it.

[sev]

I liked the guide. However, you didn't talk about the negatives of self-healing when there's a Medic on your team. This is something that is super-important. Also, I feel you are pushing a wrong tactic here:
"Make sure you ask your team to heal up any damage you didn't right before the wave starts."
♥♥♥♥ no.

First of all, if you're a Medic:
Being a compitent Medic means going all the way and not telling your team to self-heal. One good tactic is to just toss a few medinades in the Trader area if you're concerned about not getting to heal everyone during Trader time. If someone runs off as I'm healing them and they aren't at full HP, I'll damn well chase them down just to get a shot on them. When I play Medic, my first priority is making sure the team DOESN'T have to self-heal, at all. If you're a good Medic, you can achieve this. You SHOULD achieve it.

[sev]

Secondly, if you aren't the Medic:
One thing people fail to realise/remember is that people get money for healing others . Yes, I know you stated this in your guide. The thing is, it's been in the game for a quite a while, but many seem to not have noticed.
Don't self-heal unless you absolutely have to (<30 HP), and rely on your Medic (or, if you don't have one, the other members of your team). It makes you seem very unappreciative of everyone else's help when you have 90 HP and self-heal (if they care, that is; the problem is many don't). Not only that, but that's a couple pounds you could have given someone by letting them heal you. Why is doing nothing and letting others heal you to get free money not practiced more?

[sev]

It can also be detrimental to your team. For example, let's say you self-heal with ~80 HP, and you're a Support with an AA12. Suddenly, someone runs around a corner with low HP a FP on their six. Because you have your Syringe out to heal that scratch, you can't take out your shotgun and easily destroy the FP, and the guy getting chased gets clobbered. Instead of healing yourself, you should have just waited. You could have healed the guy getting chased, take out the FP, then find the rest of your team, a Medic, or even the guy you just saved, and get them to heal you.