A Comprehensive Non-stock Weapons Guide

This is a guide to all the non-stock weapons in TF2 for newer players, here you'll find a general overview of pretty much every weapon in TF2 and how to use them.

Introduction

Welcome to my guide on any and all non-stock weapons in TF2, if you're a new player who's gotten the basics down but don't know what the different weapons do, this is the guide for you, if you're a veteran player who's stumbled across this guide, welcome! I hope this guide can be helpful, I'll be going over each weapon as well as how it's best used in-game, and how to counter it, as a rule of thumb the more useful weapons will be at the top of each section, but this doesn't necessarily mean every weapon at the bottom is useless, also I will only be going over weapons that have a different effect than the stock weapons so unless a reskin changes how you play slightly I will not be going over it. Also before I get started properly if you're looking for a guide on stock weapons I have one here, it'll cover each class with their stock loadouts but if you're here I suspect you already know most of the basics.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2070902568
Anyway without further ado, let's get into this properly.

Scout's Weapons

Scout's stock weapons are already pretty powerful, with the default scattergun being able to beat soldier's damage output assuming you can aim properly, let's take a look at his alternatives and see what they do.

Scatterguns

The Force-a-Nature
This scattergun has some pretty impressive stats, with an improved firing speed, ability to knock others and yourself around, as well as more bullets per shot, this gun is pretty powerful but that power is reigned in by a 2-shot clip, a minor damage reduction, and the fact that this gun reloads it's entire clip at once, meaning if you shoot one shot and reload it'll still take 2 shells from your ammo pool. If you've been using the default scattergun a lot then you'll know exactly how to use this gun however there is a much bigger penalty for missing your shots so it's still a good idea to get as close as possible before unloading both barrels, that being said the raw damage output and knockback effects make this gun an incredibly powerful damage-dealer or a useful tool for getting up to places where your double-jump can't reach. To counter this weapon, try to keep the scout wielding it at range, since he doesn't have 4 extra shots he can't afford to waste the ammo shooting you from further away, also since you're further away the knockback effect is significantly reduced meaning he can't shove you around as much and throw off your aim.

The Soda Popper
An alternative to the Force-a-Nature, this scattergun has the same firing speed as the previous gun and an increased reload speed, however the knockback ability and extra bullets are traded away for a unique 'Hype' ability, while equipped there will be a meter in the bottom left of your screen labeled 'Hype' that only fills as you do damage, once it's full you can right-click to activate it while holding the gun, 'Hype' once activated gives you about 3-4 extra double-jumps, it used to give you mini-crits too but I think they patched that out, The gun also comes with most of the disadvantages of the Force-a-Nature luckily without the damage reduction. To use this gun effectively you'll want to stay a bit further back than usual and harass your enemy, despite the 2-shot clip the faster reload speed means you can use this more like a normal scattergun and once your hype is built up you can activate it and cause all sorts of confusion for your enemy as you rain buckshot from above. To counter this weapon, try to kill the scout before he can fill the Hype meter, fairly easy to do thanks to lack of knockback and even though it doesn't have the damage reduction, the fact that this gun has less bullets per shot means the damage output is less than the default scattergun, so if you can afford to be aggresive toward a scout wielding this weapon go for it, if he's got his hype ability active then your best hope is to use either airblast or some other form of knockback to force the scout back, and while he's dazed and confused press the advantage and do as much damage as possible.

Baby Face's Blaster
This is one of the 3 'oddball' scatterguns that scout has, similar to the Soda Popper, you'll have a 'boost' meter in the bottom left that increases as you do damage, and your running speed increases relative to this meter meaning once it's full you can zoom around the map incredibly fast, the downsides here are a 4-shot clip, your initial movement speed is reduced, and you loose boost when you double jump or get hit. This weapon heavily favors an evasive playstyle when you have a somewhat full boost meter, since you don't have your double jump advantage you're limited to where other classes can jump unless you want to sacrifice some of you precious boost, however the increased run speed means that strafing is the go-to dodge strategy and you'll want to stick to harassing 1 or 2 enemies at a time, more than that and you'll lose your boost advantage pretty quickly. To counter this weapon, pretty much any hitscan weapon will do, as long as you can do somewhat consistent damage to a scout using this weapon you can rob him of his speed advantage which will make him a pretty easy target.

The Back-Scatter
The 2nd oddball weapon in the Scattergun arsenal, the only advantage this gun has is that you get mini-crits if you hit a target from behind and at close range, besides that the downsides are a 4-shot clip, it's less accurate and it has no random crits, so luck ain't gonna to save you with this weapon sadly, this weapon favors more of a spy playstyle since you do the most damage when attacking from behind, despite the increased damage I wouldn't recommend tackling a heavy with this weapon since it doesn't do enough damage to one-shot him, and since most people turn around when they're shot from behind once you're only going to get 1 or 2 shots off before you get turned into swiss cheese. To counter this weapon pretty much just do what you normally do if you think a spy is nearby, keep your head on a swivel and be ready to blast anything that jumps out at you.

The Shortstop
The 3rd and final oddball weapon in the scattergun category, again this weapon really only has a couple of advantages, 1. it has random crits and 2. right-click lets you shove people, the shove is similar to pyro's airblast except it doesn't reflect projectiles, and the negatives only pile up from there since this gun has a 4-round clip and a reload mechanic similar to the Force-a-Nature and the Soda Popper, not to mention you also get shoved around more easily by airblasts and explosives. Luckily this gun is similar enough to the stock scattergun that you can use it like one and the shove mechanic is pretty useful if you're going up against another scout and you want to push him around and the shove also means you can help deal with an uber push by shoving the medic away from his heal target. If you want to counter this weapon then just do what you normally do for a scout, keep your distance and blast him.

Pistols/Utility Items

Mad Milk
A fairly significant breakaway from the firearms normally used by every class, Mad MIlk is a throwable item that upon hitting a player or surface, coats all enemies within the splash radius with a status effect, while an enemy is coated any damage done to them will heal the damage dealer for 60% of the damage they do, so if a soldier lands a direct hit on an enemy doing 100 damage, he will get 60 health in return, if thrown at a burning friendly this item will put out the fire and reduce the cooldown for the Mad Milk, downsides are that you don't have a pistol and you can only throw 1 bottle and must wait out a cooldown unless you visit a resupply locker. This item is best used right before you start blasting someone or on a big group of enemies so your team can heal some of the damage they're taking, you do lose some offensive capability without the pistol but your scattergun does so much damage that you're not sacrificing much. If you want to counter this item you can remove the effect by submerging your character completely in water, or if you're playing pyro you can reflect the milk bottle right back at the scout and gain the healing advantage for you and any teammates with line of sight on the scout.

Scout's Weapons Cont.

Bonk! Atomic Punch
A fairly powerful utility item, once Bonk is consumed you become invulnerable to all damage for 8 seconds, pretty much a poor man's ubercharge since you can't attack while under the effects of Bonk, and any damage you take while invulnerable will slow you down after Bonk wears off. This item is best used when you need to get past a chokepoint or if you have attracted the attention of the enemy team and need a get out of jail free card, your best counter to this item is to do as much damage to the scout as possible while he's invulnerable and chase him down once he starts running, he'll be really slow once the effects wear off so you can hunt him down easily, and airblast is also an option of course as well as explosive knockback.

Crit-a-Cola
Similar in appearnce to Bonk, this item does pretty much the opposite, instead of making you invulnerable this item will give you mini-crits for 5 seconds, however you will be marked for death for the same amount of time meaning any damage you take will also be mini-crits. This item is fairly risk vs reward, the increase in damage output means you can potentially 2-shot a heavy but the marked for death leaves you fairly vulnerable if your dodge game isn't on point, to counter this item you pretty much just need to hit the scout with 1 rocket or a couple good shots from a shotgun and he's dead.

The Flying Guillotine
Here we start getting to the oddball secondary weapons, the Flying Guillotine is another throwing weapon that upon hitting a target will cause them to bleed for a short amount of time, the further away you hit from the shorter a cooldown you get after throwing, the only downsides here are that there's no random crits and the weapon is classified as a projectile meaning it can be reflected. This weapon's best used at medium to short range where you're more likely to hit and do damage, if you can get the drop on someone with this weapon you're pretty much guaranteed a kill. To counter this all you need is a health kit to make the bleeding status effect go away, or kill the scout before he can take advantage of your dwindling health, while I did say the guillotine can be reflected due to the projectile speed this is harder to do so I wouldn't recommend it unless you're pretty confident in your reflexes.

The Winger
Another oddball weapon which is actually a pistol this time! The Winger is an interesting weapon, you get a slight damage boost as well as a boost to jump height while you have the weapon out, however your clip size is greatly reduced to about 5 bullets. This pistol is best used while retreating or as a tool to help you get to higher spots, I wouldn't go on the offensive with it though thanks to the measly 5 bullets in the clip, if you want to counter this weapon then go on the offensive when the scout pulls out this pistol, it may do more damage but if a scout has resorted to his secondary it likely means he's out of ammo in his scattergun so if you press the advantage you should be able to make him panic and throw off his aim as well as waste the precious 5 bullets per clip that he has, and if he tries jumping push him around with airblast or the shortstop.

Pretty Boy's Pocket Pistol
Glad we could get the amazing alliteration going, anyway this is the last secondary in scout's arsenal, and the last oddball secondary, this pistol has a slightly faster firing speed and give you 3 health per hit, again this is offset by a smaller clip size of 9 bullets so it's not as bad as the Winger but your offensive capability with this gun is still reduced. This weapon is best used when you're low on health and are still in a fight, as long as you're careful with your shots you can get 27 health back which not an insignificant amount in TF2, if you're looking to counter this weapon you can pretty much use the same strategy as the Winger, since if a scout is pulling out this weapon he's likely already low on health so going on the offensive in this situation is a good idea.

Melee Weapons

The Sandman
A long time ago this used to be the best melee weapon on offer for the scout, especially when paired with the Flying Guilliotine, nowadays it's still pretty useful but nowhere near the level it was. Right-click with this weapon launches a ball that upon hitting a target will slow them for a brief period, you'll have a slightly reduced max health while this weapon is equipped, however making a target slower means they'll be easier to hit with whatever weapon you choose to use. This weapon is best used on single targets that are already fairly difficult to hit like pyro or spy, and landing a hit on an enemy scout is a death sentence for him, if you know an enemy scout has this weapon equipped then you know his max health is reduced which makes him easier to kill, so if you can land a few good shots on him he'll go down faster than usual, and the ball can of course be reflected right back at him.

The Wrap Assassin
Similar in function to the previous weapon, the Wrap Assassin will launch a holiday ornament that will cause a target to bleed as well as a faster recharge time on the ornament, the straight damage done by swinging this melee weapon is greatly reduced since you hitting the enemy with a literal cardboard tube but the damage done over time with the ornament does make up for it, kinda. Similar to the Sandman this weapon's best used on single targets and can give some well-deserved payback for all the afterburn damage that pyros do, but beyond that you're better off switching to another weapon once the ball hits it's mark, to counter this weapon if you're close to a health kit you can negate any damage the ball does and/or kill the scout before he has time to take advantage of the bleed effect.

The Boston Basher
A weapon for either sadists or masochists, this weapon has the effect that upon hitting a target they will bleed for 5 seconds, but upon missing you will hit yourself applying the bleed effect to yourself on top of the base damage for a hit. While this may seem like the dumbest weapon ever made this spiked bat does have a use outside of combat, you see, medics build ubercharge faster while healing hurt teammates, so if you can convince a medic to heal you while you swing at yourself you can help him build uber fairly quickly, useful if your team needs to take down a sentry nest and you're running out of time in the match, if you're dead set on using this in combat you need to be fairly careful with your swings, one miss is all it takes to go from stomping someone into the dirt to smacking yourself in the face. To counter this weapon is pretty easy, just dodge the scout's melee swings and he'll be dead really quick, and have a medkit close by just in case.

The Holy Mackerel
This weapon is just a reskin of the bat but it has the effect that upon hitting someone the hit will appear in the killfeed, good for a laugh but otherwise functionally identical to the bat.

Scout's Weapon's Cont. x2

The Atomizer
And here's the oddball melee weapons, the Atomizer gives you a triple jump while held and any melee attacks made while airborne will be mini-crits, however damage vs players is reduced and it takes longer to pull out this melee weapon. This weapon's best used as a tool for getting up to higher areas however if used in conjunction with the Soda Popper you can bounce around a target hitting them repeatedly with mini-crits, pretty situational but interesting nonetheless, if you want to counter this weapon any sort of knockback will mess up whatever the scout is trying to do and despite his double-jumping he does have to stay fairly close to the ground for the melee swings to connect so a good rocket can blast him away.

The Candy Cane
Another festive weapon, the Candy Cane has the unique effect that while it's in your loadout every kill you get will drop a small health pack, this is offset by the increased vulnerability to explosive damage but it's still kinda useful. The Candy Cane is best used by just letting it sit in your back pocket while you grab a bunch of health, beware though, 1 rocket is all it takes for you to go down now so be wary of soldiers and demomen, the best counter to this weapon is obviously soldier or demoman since the increased vulnerability to explosives makes the scout pretty easy to kill.

The Fan O'War
A really weird weapon, the Fan O'War has the effect of upon hitting a target, they will be marked for death causing the target to take mini-crits, this weapon also grants critical hits whenever it would normally mini-crit, this is offset by a whopping 75% reduction in damage done with the weapon but most veteran players know how op the Bushwacka is so it's understandable. This weapon's best used as a utility, sneaking up and hitting an important target like a medic and then switching to your scattergun to do some real damage, your best counter to this weapon is similar to the Back Scatter, just keep a lookout for any scout trying to sneak up on you and taking him out before he can mark you for death.

The Sun-On-a-Stick
Another weird weapon, the Sun-On-a-Stick will grant critical hits against burning players as well as a resistance to fire while it's in your hand, this does come with a damage penalty but luckily it's not nearly as bad on the Fan O'War. This bat's best used while you're close to a friendly pyro since that's the only class that can light things on fire or if you have a friend you can talk with over discord and coordinate attacks with but you're better off playing as a heavy-medic combo if you got that already, I guess this weapon's also useful if you're running away from a pyro but it's kinda useless in all other cases, to counter this weapon just make sure you're not close to an enemy pyro and you're golden.

Soldier's Weapons

Before we go any further I want to leave a little memorial for Rick May, the voice of soldier, let's all take a moment of silence for Rick May.
Now on with the guide.

Rocket Launchers

The Black Box
A fairly simple weapon, the Black Box's main effect is that you gain up to 20 health depending on how much damage you do with your rocket, the big downside being you're limited to 3 rockets instead of 4, not much to say here other than the potential health you get from landing direct hits with this weapon can turn a losing battle into a narrow victory. Since you're limited to 3 rockets you'll want to use this weapon in conjunction with a shotgun due to the lower clip size, one rocket may not sound like a lot but if you're not careful with your shots you'll spending just as much time reloading as shooting, however you are able to use this weapon at closer ranges thanks to the on hit healing. To counter this weapon, pyro is a pretty good hard counter but if you're not playing pyro your best bet is to back up and move side to side, once he's emptied his clip that's your chance to attack and punish him for missing you.

The Direct Hit
A rocket launcher for those with good aim, the Direct Hit offers a 25% damage bonus, meaning rockets now do 125 damage on a direct hit (ha get it?) as well as almost double the projectile speed and guaranteed mini-crits on targets launched by explosives or grappling hooks which are only available in the mannpower mode, these upsides are balanced by a massive reduction in splash radius making the penalty for missing shots much higher. This weapon is best used more like a hitscan weapon thanks to the increased projectile speed, you'll still want to fight at closer ranges to ensure you hit your target, however thanks to the reduced splash radius you can afford to fight much closer without taking as much damage from your rocket launcher, also this weapon is the perfect sentry buster for soldier thanks to the increased damage, if you land your shots correctly you can 2 shot a level 3 sentry. To counter this weapon airblast is still an option but it's much harder due to the faster rockets so again your best friend is distance and moving as unpredictably as possible.

Beggar's Bazooka
A more interesting Launcher that has a little utility aspect to it, the Beggar's Bazooka is much different from the other launchers in the fact that it has no rockets in the clip when you first get it, holding left-click allows you to load up to 3 rockets into the clip and releasing left-click fires all loaded rockets in quick succession, the downsides here are a slightly reduced splash radius, some extra inaccuracy with the launcher, and the fact that overloading the chamber will cause the rocket to detonate on you instead of the enemy as well as the inability to collect ammunition while holding the bazooka. This weapon is best used preemptively just before you come around a corner or if you suspect an enemy is about to come around a corner and you're better off using this weapon at closer ranges where the inaccuracy is less of a problem, this weapon can also be used to gain ludicrous amounts of speed through beggar jumping, which is done by overloading the launcher and using it to propel yourself like a normal rocket jump, and using the second rocket to blast off to where you need to go, you can get away with a third rocket if you're overhealed but I wouldn't recommend more than that since you tend to lose control if you're not careful. To counter this bazooka airblast is less viable due to the firing speed of the launcher however the inaccuracy means he'll have trouble hitting you from medium to long ranges, so once again, keep your distance and keep moving, or if possible kill him while he's loading rockets, the reload animation is fairly long so if you can catch him off guard you should be able to kill him before he can shoot more than 1 or 2 rockets.

The Original
On the surface this is just a reskin of the stock rocket launcher however due to the fact the launcher sits in the middle of the screen the rockets come from a slightly different spot, this doesn't make a major change in combat but rocket jumping is a bit different thanks to the slightly different launch point for the rockets.

The Airstrike
AKA the missile hose, the Airstrike is a middle finger to pyros everywhere, you take slightly less damage from rocket jumps with this weapon but the real magic comes while you're in the air, while you're rocket jumping with this weapon it will shoot much faster while reducing the splash radius of your rockets, and for every kill you clip size increases up to a maximum of about 10 or 11, this is offset by a reduction in base damage and splash radius. This weapon's best used in conjunction with the B.A.S.E. Jumper (see Multi-Class Weapons/Items) so you can get the most out of your airtime, beyond that it's pretty much a matter of landing your shots but once you've gotten a few kills under your belt, you'll be able to rain countless rockets on the enemy team. The counters to this weapon are a bit different, thanks to the massive increase in firing speed airblast is no longer an option and dodging is even harder with the amount of rockets he'll be able to dump out however there are 2 hard counters, if you're playing as engineer the short circuit can eat an entire barrage before it lands and if he's using the parachute he'll be easy prey for snipers, beyond that your best counter is to kill him before he can get a substantial streak going.

The Cow Mangler 5000
A bit of an oddball weapon, the Cow Mangler is unique among the launchers in the fact that it doesn't require ammo allowing you to focus on keeping your clip topped off, right-click uses all 4 shots to fire a super shot capable of scoring mini-cirts on players along with setting them on fire as well as disabling enemy buildings for 4 seconds, the downsides being no random crits, a massive reduction in damage done to buildings and it only mini-crits whenever it would normally be a critical hit. Your best use of this weapon is similar to a stock rocket launcher without the ammo issue, but if you're going up against a sentry or suspect a big push coming around the corner, that's when you'll want to use the charged shot to disable the sentry for a few seconds or deal quite a bit of damage to most of the enemy team, but be careful when you time it because your movement speed will be drastically reduced while charging the shot. If you want to counter this weapon your best option is airblast or if you hear him charging up a shot, rush him down and kill him before he can get it off, worst case scenario he hits you and now both of you are burning and on low health which can momentarily give you the upper hand, you can also airblast the super projectile right back at him which will have the same effect but you'll still be at full health.

Soldier's Weapons Cont.

The Liberty Launcher
This weapon is a sort of halfway agreement between the stock launcher and the Direct Hit, the Liberty Launcher has 1 extra rocket in the clip, an increase in rocket speed and a reduction in blast damage to yourself, the only negative being your rockets will only do a max of about 75 damage. your best use of this launcher is to use it to rocket jump to unexpected places without taking as much damage and launching a few rockets before the enemy can react, like with the Direct Hit you'll want to be more careful with your shots due to the lower damage your rockets do. Airblast is more viable against this weapon since the rockets aren't nearly as fast as they are with the direct hit, and the damage penalty means you can actually take more damage from this weapon without dying so dodging rockets and getting close is a good strategy.

The Rocket Jumper
This launcher is all utility and no offensive capabilities, you'll have double your max ammo while using this weapon and you won't take any damage from your rocket jumps, however your rockets will do exactly 0 damage to the enemy team, no random crits and you cannot pick up the intelligence while you have this launcher equipped, perfect for learning how to rocket jump or for market gardening. While this weapon does no damage the soldier wielding it can still do damage with his other weapons like the market garden or shotgun, if you see a soldier jumping at you and he pulls out his shovel your best counter is to back up and shoot him when he lands, rinse and repeat until he's dead.

Secondary Weapons/Utility Items

The Concheror
One of the 4 backpack items you can equip, the Concheror replaces your shotgun with a Conch shell, and gives you a rage meter in the bottom left, once full you can left-click with this item to give you and teammates around you a speed buff and allowing both of you to receive health for damage done, you also gain medic's ability to heal slowly over time which is a pretty good advantage, the only downside being you don't have a shotgun anymore meaning once you empty your rocket launcher all you have is your melee. This item's best used when your team is about to storm the objective, giving that health for damage to your team is a huge advantage especially if you don't have a medic on the team and the speed boost means every teammate around you will be harder to hit, however you will become a pretty big target once you have this item equipped so watch your back. Your best counter to this item in all honesty is pyro, since the enemy soldier doesn't have a shotgun anymore his only means of doing any significant damage is his rocket launcher which can be hard countered using airblast, and the afterburn damage done by the stock flamethrower pretty much negates the regenerating health the Conch provides, or if you're playing engineer the short circuit can also destroy his rockets, in either case you'll want to kill him asap to reset his rage meter.

The Mantreads
A rocket jumper's best friend, the Mantreads takes the falling damage you would normally take, and deals 3 times that amount to any player you land on top of, you also get a massive reduction in knockback from most weapons including airblast and you have much greater control while you're in the air, again this does replace your shotgun so all you've got is your rocket launcher. This weapon's best used by rocket-jumping into the enemy team and landing on an important target like their medic, the damage done to them means worst case scenario they'll be on 20 health or so allowing you to kill them in a single shot, you'll want to rocket jump away asap since you'll be in the middle of the enemy team and literally every gun will be pointed at you. Again pyro is a good counter for this weapon since he'll only have his rocket launcher but your best counter is to just back up and keep shooting, despite the greater air control any soldier that rocket jumps is limited by how much speed hes gets on take-off meaning you can get outside his landing zone pretty easily if you back up, and once he's landed do as much damage as possible.

The Buff Banner
Similar to the Concheror, the Buff Banner also gives you a rage meter but upon activation, gives you and all of your teammates guaranteed mini-crits with whatever weapon they're using, again you are giving up your shotgun for this item but the damage potential with this item active more than makes up for it. This item's best used just before your team storms the objective since you increase the amount of damage everyone's doing but you can use this solo since your rockets do even more damage and can one-shot pretty much every support class while the banner is up. Your best counter is of course pyro and engineer with the short circuit, pretty much the same counters as the Conch

The Righteous Bison
Our first soldier-specific secondary that can shoot, the Righteous Bison is similar to the Cow Mangler in the fact that it doesn't require ammo, this weapon shoots a small energy bolt that penetrates enemy players and cannot be deflected, however it has a massive damage reduction vs engineer buildings so I wouldn't recommend fighting a sentry with this thing. Your best use of this weapon is when the enemy team is clustered fairly close together and you can make the most of the penetration factor however you won't do a lot of damage so only use it once you've exhausted your rockets, your best counter to this weapon is literally to just step to the side, the projectile is incredibly slow so you can dodge it really easily, and if you're playing as engineer you can hard counter this weapon with your sentry.

The Battalion's Backup
The last backpack item we'll cover in soldier's section, the Battalion's Backup gives you an extra 20 health and upon activation gives you and teammates around you immunity to crits, halves any damage an enemy sentry is doing and lessens damage of all other sources by 35%, of course you are giving up your shotgun if you use this item but the extra health and defensive boosts might be worth it if your team is having a tough time. Your best use of this weapon is just before attacking a sentry nest, halving the damage done by the enemy sentry can make you and your team last long enough to destroy it even if the engineer is actively repairing it so if you're having trouble with sentry nests use this backpack, or if you know the enemy medic has a Kritzkrieg you can completely negate his ubercharge with this item. Your best counter to this item is pyro and engineer with the short circuit of course and you'll want to kill the soldier asap to reset his rage meter.

The Gunboats
The last boots item on our list, the Gunboats are a pretty simple item, all they do is remove 60% of the damage you do to yourself when you rocket jump, again you're giving up you're shotgun if you pick this item but if you want to practice rocket jumping without being completely defenseless this is the item for you, again pyro and engineer are hard counters for this item.

Soldier's Weapons Cont. x2

Melee Weapons

The Escape Plan
Less of a weapon and more of a utility item, the Escape Plan's main effect is while this weapon is held your movement speed increases as your health decreases, the major drawbacks here are that you're marked for death while holding this weapon and a short period after swapping weapons and you don't get nearly as much health from medics while holding the pickaxe. Your best use of this weapon is to run away from fights that are going poorly, however the marked for death means you'll want to pull it out once you've broken line of sight and need to make a speedy getaway, just make sure to put it away once a medic's healing you. If you see a soldier holding this weapon he's either very low on health or doesn't know how it works so feel free to shoot him a couple times, he'll most likely die in 1 or 2 shots.

The Disciplinary Action
Another utility melee, the Disciplinary Action is fairly useful, upon striking a teammate with this whip both you and the person you just smacked will gain a speed boost for a few seconds, and if you can keep whipping them you'll keep the speed boost going, the only downside being a 25% melee damage reduction. This weapon's best used at the beginning of a match to help your team get to the objective faster or if your team doesn't have an engineer, it may not be as effective as a teleporter but it'll definitely help. In combat you'll pretty much never see this weapon unless the soldier wielding it has run out of ammo on everything else, in which case the lower damage output of the weapon means you can afford to take quite a few hits before being in any real danger, so use this opportunity to finish off the soldier.

The Equalizer
Similar to the Escape Plan, this Equalizer does more damage as your health decreases, and again you will receive much less health from medics but the damage increase might be worth it in desperate last stands. Your best use of this weapon is when you're low on health and are out of ammo on everything else, even though you're announcing to the enemy 'hey I'm really low on health shoot me please' the equalizer can give you just enough of an edge that you can come out of a fight on top if you can get a couple of hits in. Countering is similar to the Escape Plan, any soldier that pulls out this weapon is likely already low on health so one or two shots should do him in.

The Market Gardener
A powerful tool in the right hands, the Market Gardener deals guaranteed crits while you are rocket jumping, it has a slightly slower firing speed and has no random crits but the potential to kill an enemy in one melee swing is very powerful. This weapon is best used in conjunction with the Rocket Jumper since you'll tend to miss your swings a lot until you get the hang of rocket jumping and you'll lose a lot of health really fast if you attempt to use a normal launcher. As stated in the Rocket Jumper section if you see a soldier with an orange launcher jumping towards you and he pulls his shovel out, start backing up and shooting to make him miss and try to kill him before he jumps away again.

Pyro's Weapons

To finish off the offense category let's take a look at everyone's favorite pyromaniac, the Pyro and see what weapons he/she is packing.

Flamethrowers

The Degreaser
A powerful utility flamethrower, The Degreaser's main upsides are the faster weapon swap to the weapon and when switching away from the weapon, as well as the usual health boost from extinguishing teammates with airblast, however your afterburn damage is pitiful compared to other flamethrowers and it costs 25 ammo every time you press right-click. This weapon's best used in conjunction with any of the flare guns or shotguns, your afterburn may not do as much damage but the faster weapon swap means weapons like the Flare Gun can do much more damage than they otherwise normally would, and the damage you cause by holding the flame on someone isn't nerfed so if you need to burn someone to the ground it's still possible but it will still take longer than a normal flamethrower. Your best counter to this weapon is to simply keep your distance and hit the enemy pyro with a shotgun or some other bullet-based weapon, firing rockets or grenades is a bit more viable due to the increased airblast cost meaning he/she can only airblast 8 times before draining themselves of ammo.

The Dragon's Fury
An interesting weapon and a somewhat more recent addition to pyro's arsenal, the Dragon's Fury instead of spewing a constant stream of flames, instead fires a rocket-like fireball that acts like a short range Direct Hit, it also has a pressure tank that both the fireball attack and airblast share, meaning until the meter under your ammo is full you can't fire or airblast, it also deals massive damage to enemies on fire and repressurizes faster as you continue to land hits on enemies regardless if they're on fire or not, the major downside here being that the pressure meter fills much slower after using airblast meaning the penalty for missing a rocket or grenade is much higher. This weapon is best used in an offensive playstyle where you're getting close to the enemy and continously landing shots, the chaotic power of this weapon is further improved if you equip the Thermal Thruster and land right in the middle of the enemy team, you may not make out alive but the distraction can buy valuable time for your team to build up an ubercharge or you end up killing most of the enemy team and forcing them to wait out a respawn timer. This weapon's best counter is mobility, since the fireball acts like a projectile attempting to throw off the enemy pyro's aim by strafing works fairly well, scouts in particular can give pyros wielding this weapon a hard time due to their mobility and while he/she may be able to reflect one rocket they won't be able to reflect a sustained barrage, so as long as you dodge the first reflect you can land a couple of damaging shots on them before they have a chance to react.

The Phlogistinator
The very definition of risk vs reward, the Phlog is a powerful weapon in the hands of a competent pyro, as you deal damage with this weapon you will fill an Mmmph meter similar to the rage meter on soldier, once the meter is full you can either right-click or taunt to activate the meter which gives you guaranteed crits for several seconds, and you will also be temporarily ubercharged while taunting, however the major downsides are a lack of random crits and no airblast whatsoever, and the 'flames' of this weapon travel in a much straighter line meaning you can't spread the damage around as effectively. This weapon's best used in close quarters, since you don't have the safety of airblast to reflect rockets your best chance at doing damage and filling that meter is to stick to tight corridors where you can surprise enemies more effectively. The best counter to this weapon is simple, play soldier or demoman, since the phlog has no airblast you can feel free to blast away with all of your explosives without fear of them being reflected back at you, and if you see/hear a pyro taunting, back up the crits from the phlog can burn you down in seconds so even if a pyro is bluffing and has a different flamethrower, distance is your best friend against a pyro.

The Rainblower
While this weapon is simply a reskin of the stock flamethrower the Rainblower has the added effect while it's equipped you will be in 'pyroland' which is an alternate version of most of the maps with cake and presents instead of health kits and ammo, it can be a little jarring at first but other than the added effects that are there for laughs this weapon's functionally identical to the stock flamethrower.

The Backburner
A bit of an Oddball weapon, the Backburner functions similarly to the Back Scatter, if you attack an enemy from behind you will get guaranteed crits however the ammo cost for airblast is massively increased so I wouldn't recommend trying to reflect rockets. This weapon's best use is in more a spy role rather than the traditional pyro role, if you can sneak behind the enemy team you can pretty much wipe them all out if they're not very aware of their surroundings, however against a good team/player they will pretty much always be looking around for spies so I wouldn't recommend it unless you can get the drop on them. The best counter to this weapon is to simply always look around and double-check your surroundings, and if you're playing as soldier or demo you can treat this weapon like the phlog, the massive increase in airblast cost means if they try to reflect even 1 rocket they'll lose a pretty good chunk of their ammo reserve.

Flare Guns/Utility Items

The Thermal Thruster
A powerful mobility tool, the Thermal Thruster is literally a jetpack, it has 2 charges that slowly refill over time, left-click will send you careening forward in an arc in the direction you're aiming allowing you to cross vast distances at about the same speed as a well-executed rocket jump, it also functions similarly to the mantreads, dealing 3x falling damage to any enemy you land on as well as pushing enemies back within a small radius, the obvious downside is that you're trading away your shotgun by equipping this item as well as an increase in the holster time. Your best use of this weapon is to take flank routes you normally wouldn't be able to and cause havoc in the enemy's backlines, or use it to launch yourself right into the middle of the enemy team and cause as much chaos as possible before you die, of course the best pairing is the Dragon's Fury but you can use pretty much any flamethrower. Your best counter to this weapon is to treat the pyro using it more like a soldier, however the predictable arc he/she travels in means you can get a few easy airshots in before he/she lands as long as you're keeping an eye on the sky.

Pyro's Weapons Cont.

The Flare Gun
One of the most damaging secondaries in the right hands, the Flare Gun replaces your shotgun with a single shot flare gun that shoots a projectile that lights enemies on fire and scores guaranteed crits on burning players, of course you are trading away your shotgun for this weapon and you will be less effective against enemy pyros since the flare can be reflected but the damage potential might just be worth it. The best use of this weapon is with the Degreaser, with both weapons equipped you can light an enemy on fire with the Degreaser and then quickly switch to the flare gun for a guaranteed crit if your aim is good. Your best counter to this weapon is to play pyro with a shotgun, while the initial impact may hurt your immunity to afterburn completely negates the Flare Gun's main upside, so if you can keep your distance and unload shells into him/her you should come out on top more often than not.

The Gas Passer
Another interesting utility, the Gas Passer is similar to the mad milk as a throwable, it's main effect upon landing is the creation of a cloud of gas that will coat any enemy who walks into it and anyone affected by the gas will be set on fire upon taking any damage from another player, however with the added twist of damage also speeding up the cooldown timer rather than just waiting out a full cooldown and the meter carries over between lives, but the major downside being you cannot use a resupply locker to fill the meter and said meter starts empty, and of course you are trading away your shotgun for this item. Your best use of the Gas Passer is when the enemy team is clumped up so you can toss it on them and start scoring some free fire damage, of course the cooldown is really long so you'll want to be on the front lines dishing out as much damage as possible, once you have the meter full be careful when you throw it because even with consistent damage output that cooldown is really long. Your best counter to this item is to trick the enemy pyro into using it early or killing him/her before he/she can get a decent amount of damage done to your team, and if you get splashed find some water to submerge yourself in or visit a resupply locker and avoid any damage sources you can predict so you don't get set on fire.

The Scorch Shot
An alternative to the Flare Gun, the Scorch Shot is a single-shot flare gun that deals mini-crits vs burning players and the projectile explodes after hitting something that's not a player, it also does knockback upon hitting a target and this effect is increased if said target is on fire, however it doesn't do as much damage as the normal Flare Gun and you can hurt yourself with this weapon which can be used to do small 'flare jumps' but you're better off using the thruster for mobility. Again your use of this weapon is identical to the standard Flare Gun but now you can use it you push enemies back and shove them around without have to use airblast which can help against players using hitscan weapons to throw off their aim. Similar to the Flare Gun your best counter is to play pyro however you will need to be a little more careful with your shots due to the knockback and explosion radius of this weapon, even a near miss can throw off you aim just a little.

The Detonator
Another alternative to the Flare Gun, the Detonator also deals mini-crits vs burning players and instead of the flare detonating on the ground, you can use right-click to detonate it at any time before it hits the ground, it does come with a damage penalty that's a little less than the Scorch Shot however damage to yourself is increased which can be used for more effective flare jumps but again, you're better off using the thruster for mobility. Again you can use this weapon nearly identical to the Flare Gun but now you can ensure you do damage even if you miss slightly, just make sure you time it right otherwise it really will miss, and if you're dead set on trying out flare jumping this is probably the easiest weapon to do it with. Again your best counter is to play pyro although this time you don't really have to worry about missing that much and the damage reduction means you won't take as much damage if you get hit so scout is also a viable counter here.

The Manmelter
A bit of an oddball weapon, the Manmelter is similar to the Flare Gun only in appearance, it fires a much faster energy bolt that I don't think can be reflected, it also doesn't require ammo and right-clicking with this weapon on a burning teammate does exactly what airblast would do with the added bonus of giving you guaranteed crits, the only downsides being a slow firing speed and no random crits. Your best use of this weapon would be with the phlog so you can at the very least put out any fires an enemy pyro has started while giving you a good damage boost for a shot or 2, however imo there are better alternatives to this weapon. If you want to counter this weapon try not to set enemies on fire near the enemy pyro to prevent him from gaining those crits, instead you'll want to face him head on but keep your distance in case he switches to his flamethrower, the increase in projectile speed means you'd have to move outside your effective range for almost any class to safely dodge the projectiles so you're better off doing as much damage as possible without getting too close.

Fire Axes/Melee Weapons

The Powerjack
An fairly useful mobility tool, the Powerjack provides a faster movement speed while held and awards you 25 health for every kill, this is offset by a 20% damage vulnerability while held so be careful when you pull it out. This weapon's best used in loadouts that don't include the Thermal Thruster, if you need to get to the front lines quicker pull this hammer out and start running, you'll want to put it away just before you get to the front lines so you don't take any extra damage, This weapon's best counter is to simply shoot any pyro holding it, the damage vulnerability means any enemy pyro wielding this weapon will die fairly quickly.

The Homewrecker
An pybro's best friend, the Homewrecker's main upside is it's ability to remove sappers as well as an increase in damage done to enemy buildings, this is offset by a damage reduction vs players but if you're using this sledgehammer you'll probably be using a flamethrower for that. This weapon's best used if you're sitting around a friendly engineer's nest keeping watch for spies, if the engineer is away and a spy starts sapping his stuff then you can both kill the spy and save the engineer's buildings if he's not around to remove the sappers himself, or if you can somehow get close enough to an enemy sentry with this weapon it should go down in 1 or 2 swings, your best counter to this weapon is again, shoot the enemy pyro wielding it, if they're trying to use it against players they probably don't know how the weapon works, if you're a spy however you'll want to try and lead the pyro away from the nest before you try and stab him/her however your revolver would be a better choice against pyros, once they're dead make your way back to the nest and start sapping.

Pyro's Weapons Cont. x2

The Axtinguisher/Postal Pummeler
Bad puns aside the Axtinguisher is an interesting fire axe with the Postal Pummler functioning nearly identical, both min-crit burning targets but also stop them from burning, both do more damage depending on how much time afterburn has left and any kills with these weapons grant a temporary speed boost, this comes with a base damage reduction, no random crits and the weapons are slower to switch away from so be certain you hit someone before putting it away. These weapons are best used with the Degreaser to get a quick mini-crit on low-health players, however you'll want to be careful when to pull it out since it takes longer to switch back to a weapon that can do some damage at range, if you run into a pyro using this weapon your best counter is to back up and wait out the afterburn or find some water to submerge yourself in to put out the fire, these weapons' damage is based on how much afterburn is left so if you can force him/her to miss or find a way to negate the afterburn you can nullify any damage he/she could've done with this axe/mailbox.

The Back Scratcher
Another risk vs reward weapon, the Back Scratcher comes with a base damage boost as well as an increase in health from health packs while held, the only downside is less health from medics and dispensers while it's held. This weapon is best used in a roaming pyro loadout, switch to it when you're picking up health from a medkit or to get a few damaging melee swings before setting your target ablaze, you'll want to switch away from it if a medic's healing you or if you're near a dispenser but the damage bonus might be worth it, you'll need to know where the medkits are on the map but if you've played scout for a while you should know the layout of most maps. Again your best counter to this weapon is to back up and force the pyro to miss, if you're fighting near a health pack grab it before they can to rob them of their potential health advantage, or if you see them going for a health pack they're probably low on health already so try to take them out before they get to the pack.

The Lollichop
Pretty much the Rainblower but for your fire axe, again good for a laugh but it's functionally identical to the stock axe.

The Neon Annihilator
The foundation of the pyroshark, the Neon Annihilator also removes sappers similar to the homewrecker but with the added bonus of guaranteed crits vs wet players, this counts for players submerged in water, players standing in water, or players who've recently climbed out of the water and are soaking wet, the damage potential is offset by a lack of random crits and a small base damage reduction with this weapon. This weapon's best used on maps that have water on them somewhere, since not a lot of maps have water on them the weapon ends up being fairly situational, however when are on a map with water, you'll want to stick close to it and relentlessly hunt down anyone who dares enter the pool, even with the damage reduction most soaked classes will die in 1 or 2 swings. Your best counter is simple, if you know the enemy pyro is using this weapon, don't go in the water, if you absolutely have to go through the water then kill the pyroshark before you do so you don't risk taking massive damage.

The Hot Hand
Nearly functionally identical to the Holy Mackerel, the Hot Hand also has the effect upon a successful hit you will get a temporary speed boost as well as the Holy Mackerel's effect of slaps appearing in the killfeed, this is offset but a base damage reduction but if you're looking to mess around this is a good weapon to mess around with and have some fun. Since this is mostly just for laughs you can afford to take a couple of swings however your pride may be hurt due to the fact you just got slapped in the face by one of the slower classes in the game.

The Third Degree
Another oddball weapon, the Third Degree has effect upon hitting a player, any medics healing said player will also be hit and vice versa, this is offset by nothing, nada, there are no downsides to having this weapon equipped besides having a brightly colored axe. Your best use of this weapon is when attacking medic combos of any sort, you'll still want to attack the medic with your flamethrower first but once he's on fire start swinging, the target he's healing will also be hit and once the medic's dead you can deal with a somewhat damaged enemy. Your best counter to this weapon is simple, if you're playing medic and you notice a pyro trying to hit you with this weapon, stop healing whoever you were healing and deal with the pyro, once you stop healing someone you've robbed the enemy pyro of his only advantage with the axe, if you're the heal target and you notice your medic's not healing you, turn around and check on him to see if he just switched heal targets or if he's in dire need of assistance.

The Sharpened Volcano Fragment
The last axe(?) in pryo's arsenal, the Sharpened Volcano Fragment has the unique effect of setting a target on fire when you hit them, this is offset by a base damage penalty but to be totally honest you're better off with a different melee since you can already set people on fire with your flamethrower. The only use I can see with this weapon is with the degreaser, since it's afterburn is so pitiful you can instead airblast a target into a corner and hit them with your axe to do a decent amount of afterburn damage, but again, you're better off with a different melee since the Flare Gun can already do this and has the possibility of doing more damage with a guaranteed crit. If you want to counter this weapon just back up and keep shooting.

Demoman's Weapons

To start off the defense category we'll look at Demoman's weapons, as the scottish king of explosions we're bound to find something good.

Grenade Launchers/Boots

The Loch-n-Load
The perfect sentry buster, the Loch-n-Load has an increase in projectile speed as well as a damage boost vs buildings meaning this launcher can take down a level 3 sentry in 2 hits if the enemy engineer isn't paying attention, however you only have 3 shots in your clip, the blast radius is reduced and the grenades you launch shatter upon hitting anything that's not a player or building. Your best use of this weapon is when your team is having trouble with a particularly annoying sentry, to 2-shot kill potential of this launcher means you can take down entire nests in a heartbeat, and since demo is put into this sentry buster role most of the time this launcher isn't a bad choice, you'll want to be careful with your shots though since you only have 3 grenades per clip. If you want to counter this weapon airblast is always on option however it's much harder to reflect this launcher's projectiles due to the increased speed so the better option is to strafe like mad and close the distance so the enemy demo takes damage from his own grenades, if you're an engineer the Wrangler's probably your best bet of saving your sentry since the pills travel too fast to get an effective reaction shot with the Short Circuit, that being said flanking and surprising the enemy demo is the best strategy since then he has to pay attention to 2 targets and doesn't have enough ammo in his clip for both of you.

The Loose Cannon
AKA the long-range airblast, the Loose Cannon has a few interesting effects, first the fuse time for cannonballs is 1 second and can be shortened by holding left-click, second cannonballs do not explode on impact, instead they knock the target back and if the bomb explodes after hitting someone the resulting explosion does a guaranteed mini-crit, as well as a projectile speed increase similar to the Loch. This weapon's best used against players however the shortened fuse means you can't do the classic spam over the hill technique, you need to hit a player squarely in the chest and time the fuse properly in order to get that destructive 'double-donk' and do as much damage as possible, it may not sound like much but in the hands of an experienced player this weapon can wipe out entire teams. If you want to counter this weapon airblast is a good counter however an experienced player knows exactly how to time the fuse so your best strategy is to fake him out, run forward and force him to shorten the fuse, then back up so the cannonball detonates early, you can keep doing these feints and doing damage until he's dead, but you are playing a very deadly game if you try this tactic so stay on your toes.

The Bootlegger/Ali Baba's Wee Booties
Part of the demoknight loadout both of these boots grant additional max health and an increase in turning control while charging with a shield, you'll also get faster movement speed with a shield equipped and melee kills will refill your charge meter, the obvious downside here is you're giving up your grenade launcher for either set of boots but the massive increase in melee utility may be worth it. These boots are best used in conjunction with one of the 3 shields and one of the many melee options demo has, these types of loadouts are known as demoknight loadouts and can be very deadly vs an inexperienced team, also good for a laugh since you're running around the modern battlefield with ye olde weaponry. If you want to counter a demoknight your best bet is pyro since airblast is able to nullify any potential melee damage and depending on the shield, you can also do a significant amount of fire damage.

The Iron Bomber
The last primary launcher and therefore the first oddball in demoman's arsenal, the Iron Bomber fires rounded grenades that despite being spheres, have very little roll as well as a shorter fuse, however they also have a slightly decreased explosion radius which again, makes the over the hill technique somewhat ineffective. This launcher's best used like a sticky launcher that uses a timer instead of a button, if you know an enemy's about to come around a corner you can quickly 'trap' it with this launcher, it's also effective on the retreat or if someone's pushing you since the decreased blast radius means you can use it at closer ranges. if you want to counter this weapon airblast is probably the best option while the demo is shooting but if the grenades have already landed you're better off backing up since projectiles you airblast can damage you, but not your team.

Stickybomb Launchers/Shields

The Scottish Resistance
For when you need to trap an entire continent, the Scottish Resistance boasts a faster firing speed, increased max ammo for the launcher itself, the ability to place 6 more stickybombs and to only detonate stickybombs near your crosshairs as well as the ability to destroy enemy stickybombs, all of these advantages are offset by an increased arming time for the placed bombs, doesn't sound like much of a downside but it's a very different story in practice. your best use of this launcher is on defense to lay several traps that you can trigger independently and deny the enemy team the most vital routes, if you're retreating you'll need to switch to your grenade launcher since the increased arming time for this weapon means you can't spam stickybombs and detonate them quickly but the ability to independently trigger traps does give you the element of surprise. The best counter for this weapon is to constantly keep watch for sticky traps and defuse them if possible by airblasting them, detonating explosives or just shooting them, once you've made it past the traps find and kill the demo who placed them to ensure you get rid of any other traps he may have set.

Demoman's Weapons Cont.

The Chargin' Targe
Our first shield for demoman, the Chargin' Targe is a shield that allows you to charge straight at the enemy by pressing right-click, this charge also removes any debuffs applied to you like mad milk, gas from the gas passer, etc., you'll also get a guranteed critical melee swing after impacting an enemy target however the main upside to having this shield equipped is the halving of fire damage done to you and a 30% reduction in explosive damage done to you which makes this shield the best defensive buff to yourself you can pick, you are giving up your stickybomb launcher by picking this shield but the boosts just might be worth it. This shield's best used in a demoknight loadout with one of the boots in the primary slot and a sword like the eyelander in the melee spot, the boots give you extra control during a charge helping you ensure you hit a target and the sword has an extended melee range also helping you hit that critical strike, you are limited to your melee however so attacking pyros is ill-advised despite the fire damage reduction, you can partially solve this by having a grenade launcher in your primary slot creating a sort of 'hybridknight' loadout which combines the melee boosts of the charge with the offensive capability of the grenade launcher to create a fairly powerful class, you are giving up charge control but the power of the grenade launcher cannot be understated. If you're looking to counter this item airblast/explosive knockback can almost completely stop a charge denying the enemy demoman the guaranteed crit as well as the damage from the impact, however if the demo's not charging you're better off switching to your shotgun due to the pitiful amount of damage your rocket/grenade launcher or flamethrower does.

The Splendid Screen
A more offense-oriented shield, the Splendid Screen gives up some of the damage resistance from the Chargin' Targe and increases the amount of damage the charge itself does as well as how fast it recharges, other than that you still have a charge meter and you're still giving up your stickybomb launcher for this shield. Again this weapon's best used in a demoknight loadout however it can be used in a hybridknight loadout as well to further increase your damage with the charge however the reduced charge control does mean you'll have a harder time hitting those damaging charges. Countering this shield is similar to the Chargin' Targe but with a much bigger emphasis on either dodging the charge or disrupting it, since it does so much damage if the enemy demo can land a single melee swing on you, crit or not you're probably going to be on very low health, however both explosive and fire damage can do more against a demo with this shield so only switch to your shotgun if the fight isn't going well and you need to end it fast.

The Tide Turner
Our last shield on the list, the Tide Turner is a hybridknight's best friend, while the damage resistance is further reduced the Tide Turner makes up for it by giving you full charge control, meaning you can turn an a dime while charging with this shield, and it still emphasizes melee kills by refilling the meter 75% for each melee kill, again charge works the same as it does on every shield but with the added downside that any damage taken reduces how much further you can charge. Like I said before this shield is a hybridknight's best friend, the full charge control means you don't have to equip any boots to ensure you hit a target with the charge, however you'll want to play a bit more defensively with this shield since you don't have nearly as much damage reduction as the other shields so you're better off using the charge to get out of bad situations and only using it to chase down pesky targets like scouts, spies, or any class that is a guaranteed melee kill after impact. If you want to counter this item then do as much damage to the demo while he's charging, whether he's using it to attack you or get away, any damage done to him during the charge reduces how much charge he has left so shooting him before he gets away can ensure that you catch up to him before he gets to safety, flamethrowers and explosive weapons are much stronger against this shield so feel free to blast away.

The Quickiebomb Launcher
The only other stickybomb launcher that can do damage, the Quickiebomb Launcher is pretty much the antithesis of the Scottish Resistance, it can still destroy enemy stickybombs however the arming time is reduced and you can charge up a shot much faster meaning you can shoot a sticky much further, and much faster, also the stickies themselves do more damage based on how much you charged up the shot, the downsides here being the stickybombs do less base damage and you can only have 4 stickies in the clip, I believe you can still lay down 8 stickies but I have yet to confirm this. While the stat boosts are impressive this weapon's best used to clear out enemy sticky traps thanks to the reduced arming time, you can also use this weapon on the retreat more effectively since the stickybombs arm faster, however they don't do as much damage meaning it'll take 1 or 2 more stickies to kill an enemy so be careful with your shots, sticky traps can be more effective with this weapon too if you take the time to hold down left-click for each bomb. Your best counter to this launcher is to treat it like more like a grenade launcher, despite the decreased arming time dodging the bombs is easier at range and since the enemy demo's only got 4 in his clip he can't spam stickies as much meaning you can close in for the kill once he's fired off 4 shots.

The Sticky Jumper
For practicing stickybomb jumps, the Sticky Jumper is pretty much the Rocket Jumper for demo, it does no damage to yourself or enemies and has increased max ammo for the launcher, it doesn't do random crits, you can only lay 2 stickies on the ground and you cannot capture the intell with this weapon equipped. Like the Rocket Jumper is launcher's best used to practice stickybomb jumps or if you just want to mess around/annoy an enemy sniper, unlike the Rocket Jumper there isn't a weapon to go with it and capitalize on being mid-air but you can give the enemy team a nasty surprise by jumping into the entire enemy team with an Ullapool Caber.

Melee Weapons

The Eyelander/Nessie's Nine Iron
The first 2 large melee weapons we'll take a look at, the Eyelander/Nessie's Nine Iron is a sword/golf club that has the main benefit of an extended melee range as well as the interesting effect of heads taken increasing your health and movement speed, this is offset by a slow draw and holster speed, no random crits, and a lower max health pool, the extended range and draw/holster time is the same for every large melee weapon. This weapon's best used in a demoknight loadout since the decreased health tends to make you pretty frail in a hybridknight loadout even with the resistance buffs of the shields, and a pure demoknight loadout nullifies the downside of a slower draw/holster time. Your best counter these weapons is airblast and explosive knockback, since demoknight is restricted to melee and hybridknight is pretty frail with this weapon you can pretty much hard-counter both with a rocket launcher or flamethrower, be warned however, the range of the sword is much longer than you think it is so be sure to back up more than you normally would.

Demoman's Weapons Cont. x2

The Claidheamh Mòr
No I have no idea how to pronounce this either, the Claidheamh Mòr is a large melee weapon that slightly increases the charge time of your shield and melee kills refill the charge meter by 25%, downsides are no random crits and a 15% damage vulnerability while holding this sword. This weapon's best used in conjunction with any of the shields to reduce the recharge time for the charge as well as increasing how much charge you have, the Tide Turner's probably the best shield you can use here since you can get a guaranteed charge refill on a melee kill as well as giving you a bit more charge in case someone decides to start shooting you when you charge, similar to the powerjack you'll want to only use this weapon when you can guarantee a kill so despite the longer draw/holster time this sword's better used in a hybridknight loadout since you won't have your melee out 100% of the time. Again your best counter to this weapon is distance and airblast, the damage vulnerability means that even with the damage resistance of the shields explosive weapons and flamethrowers do more damage against demos wielding this weapon.

The Persian Persuader
A melee weapon that chews ammo, the Persian Persuader is another large melee weapon that refills your charge meter on a melee hit along with collecting ammo boxes, the major downsides here being the usual no random crits as well as a reduction of max ammo for both launcher slots, hence the ammo chewing. This sword's best used in a pure demoknight loadout since a hybridknight loadout would cut your ammo reserves by 80%, again this sword can be used with any of the shields but the persuader has the advantage of charge meter refilling on hit rather than on kill, meaning you don't have to do as much damage to fill your charge meter and anyone you do kill drops an ammo box which also fills your charge meter, so you can get a guaranteed full charge meter no matter which shield you're using if you can keep doing enough damage. As always distance and airblast is your friend here however if you know the enemy demo charged recently and you see him going for an ammo box, either kill him before he gets there or start backing up to try and get outside his charge range because another one's comin' soon.

The Scotsman's Skullcutter
When you want to axe the enemy a question, the Scotsman's Skullcutter is the final large melee weapon specific to demo, all this axe does is increase your melee damage, however your movement speed is also decreased, but the increased damage does mean you can 2-shot any class with 150 health or lower. This weapon's best used in a demoknight loadout thanks to the movement speed increase from the boots although you won't be as speedy as you normally would, the straight damage increase can be pretty powerful in 1v1 fights or if you're up against a Half-Zatoichi (see Multiclass Weapons/Items) demoknight and don't want to risk the instant kill rule. To counter this weapon again airblast and distance are king here and heavy can mow down pretty much any demoknight since shields don't give any bullet resistance and even with the damage increase it's going to take 4 swings to kill a full-health heavy in which time you'll already be spun-up and spraying bullets.

The Ullapool Caber
For when you want to give the enemy an explosive surprise, the Ullapool Caber is a literal hand grenade that will explode upon hitting any surface including players, walls, as long as it's a solid surface the first hit will cause the weapon to detonate in your hand, downsides are a slower swing speed, no random crits and double the draw time, also you're hitting the enemy with a hand grenade so you will damage yourself. To be honest this weapon's kind of a throwaway, you could probably surprise the enemy my using the sticky jumper to get in the middle of the enemy team and give them a nasty surprise, but the explosion only does enough damage to maybe put scouts in danger of death and it does damage to you, also you have to visit a resupply locker to get another melee explosion, so good for a laugh I guess but don't expect to do much damage with it. You know the drill here, airblast and distance are the best counters here, if he's trying to detonate on your team you could run up and have him detonate on you a safe distance from everyone else so he wastes the caber and is front of your entire team, but I imagine not a lot of you are selfless enough to do that so just treat him like a demoknight.

Heavy's Weapons

Time for the big man himself, let's take a look at heavy's weapons and see how many bullets we can fill the enemy with.

Miniguns

The Tomislav
The biggest tommy gun you've ever seen, the Tomislav is an interesting minigun, boasting a faster spin-up time and higher accuracy as well as a silent spin sound for the barrel, the only downside being a slower fire rate, a pretty nice gun all-round. This weapon's best used like a more accurate minigun, meaning you can position yourself further away than you normally would as heavy and have a better chance of hitting a sniper and throwing off his aim before he headshots you, you'll want to be a little more careful in close quarters since the increase in accuracy means you'll have a bit harder time hitting stuff if your aim isn't on point, and the silent spin means you can surprise the enemy team by hiding around a corner spun-up and they won't notice until you start shooting. To counter this weapon you'll want to move around as much as possible to throw off the enemy heavy's aim, or find some cover and strafe out to shoot, then strafe back into to cover as quickly as possible, since all the miniguns are hitscan weapons this strategy can work on pretty much every heavy, and of course sniper's a hard counter to heavy but you probably already know this if you've played TF2 for a while.

The Natascha
For when that one scout just won't die, the Natascha is a pretty strong choice against a mobile team, every time you hit the enemy with this weapon they'll get a slowness debuff which increases as you keep shooting them, this weapon also gives a slight damage resistance if you're below half health and you have the gun spinning, these upsides are offset by a straight damage penalty and a slower spin-up time. You'll want to use this weapon in more open areas where you can more consistently track targets and keep applying the speed debuff, it's also good at taking down any explosive jumping class mid air so if they try to rocket jump at you just keep shooting. Due to the speed debuff moving around to throw off the enemy heavy's aim is not a viable strategy, however cover is still king here so if you can help it, don't get caught in the open, distance also helps here too thanks to this minigun's accuracy.

The Brass Beast
When steampunk meets TF2, the Brass Beast is a bit of an oddball weapon but fairly useful if you've got a medic healing you, it grants a straight damage bonus as well as the damage resistance perk from the Natascha, however it has a much slower spin-up and your movement speed is much slower while holding this weapon, being near glacial speeds while the gun is spinning. This gun's best used on defense in key positions where a sentry might normally be, the damage bonus means you can more effectively punish anyone who's overextended and deal with players on the objective much faster, just be sure to keep the gun spinning as much as possible so you don't have to go through the excruciating spin-up. Again cover is king here however the enemy heavy is forced into a more static position thanks to this weapon's downsides meaning if you hear him spin-down you know you can pop out and gets some free shots in before he spins up again, and you can also maneuver yourself to a better position and be fairly confident he's still in the same spot.

The Huo-Long Heater
For when spies keep backstabbing you, the Huo-Long Heater is a bit of an oddball weapon, it creates a ring of fire around you while it's spinning and does more damage against players who are burning, the downsides here are a slight damage penalty and the gun consumes ammo while the ring of fire is active. Your best use of this gun is pretty much just like the stock minigun but you'll need to keep an eye on your ammo since this weapon will chew through ammo if you're not careful, and you hear someone start yelling about fire behind you, that's a spy you should probably turn around also if you see any enemies on fire they're pretty good targets thanks to the damage bonus vs burning players. Countering this weapon's pretty much the same as the other guns but if you're on fire you need to put yourself out first before engaging so you don't get killed when you poke your head out to take a shot.

Shotguns/Food Items

The Sandvich
An incredibly powerful food item, the Sandvich replaces your shotgun with a sandwich, pressing left-click or taunting will make heavy eat the sandwich, it only gets used if you've lost health so you can infinitely eat the Sandvich if you're at full health which goes for most lunch box items, during the animation any health you've lost will be replenished up to 300 health, and you can also right-click to throw it to teammates or enemies which will replenish health they've lost, about as much as a medium health pack, also you can get a new Sandvich by walking over a health pack at full health or by visiting a resupply locker and it slowly recharges over time after use so if there's not a health pack nearby you can just wait out the cooldown. Despite replacing the shotgun this lunchbox is probably the most useful secondary for Heavy, if you're low on health you can go around a corner and gain a full heal after a couple of seconds letting you get back into the fight quickly, or if you have a medic healing you and he's low on health, toss a Sandvich to him to keep him alive. If you want to counter this weapon then all you need to do is pay attention to when the Heavy takes cover, if he doesn't have a medic he's probably going to heal himself and he's completely vulnerable while he's eating so rush him if you hear him om nom nomming on his favorite meal.

The Second Banana
Food that will drive you bananas, the Second Banana trades away some of the healing effect of the Sandvich for an increased recharge rate, this time if you drop the banana for a friend it only heals about as much as a small health kit but the higher recharge rate means you'll pretty much always have one ready. If your team doesn't have a medic and you're the only heavy you can equip this item to toss to your teammates and help keep them alive, the increased recharge rate means you won't have to walk over a health kit and can instead wait out the cooldown and leave the health for other people if you're at full health. Again countering this weapon is similar to the Sandvich however a good heavy will always be tossing these out for his teammates so after you kill him take a look around for any bananas so the enemy team doesn't have the health advantage for a little while.

The Dalokohs Bar
An interesting food item, the Dalokohs Bar only replenishes 100 health however it also grants an additional 50 health to your max health for 30 seconds, sharing it with a friend only heals the same amount as the Second Banana but better than nothing I suppose. This chocolate bar is best used just before getting to the front lines, while the max health increase isn't major, it does mean you can eat 3 direct rockets before being in danger of dying and overheal also increases slightly which can help a lot. If you know the enemy heavy is using this item be prepared to shoot him a little more than usual, other than that strategy is almost identical to the Sandvich.

Heavy's Weapons Cont.

The Family Business
The only heavy-specific shotgun, the Family Business trades some damage from the stock shotgun to ensure hit probability with an 8 round clip and slightly faster firing speed, while the damage isn't great the 2 extra shots can give you the edge in a firefight. As heavy you should primarily be using your minigun however this is a pretty powerful backup weapon, and if you really want to go shotgun heavy this is probably the best gun to do that strategy with and/or mess around with too. Countering this weapon is similar to the shotgun, keeping your distance and forcing the enemy heavy to miss is the best strategy here but you will have 2 more shots to dodge, as long as you can keep doing damage and avoiding it in return you should do fine, and if you have your team nearby you should be golden.

The Buffalo Steak Sandvich
A bit of an oddball food item, the Buffalo Steak Sandvich instead of granting health, instead grants an offensive buff that increases movement speed and any attacks are guaranteed mini-crits, however you are limited to your melee and the effect last for 16 seconds, also throwing it to friends grants the same amount of health as a Sandvich. Your best use of this steak is with the Killing Gloves of Boxing to surprise the enemy if they're attempting to rush you, or if you're about to rush them, using this item can turn your fists into Scotsman's Skullcutters however despite the speed increase, you are still the slowest class so you'll only want to go after slower classes like soldier and demoman. If you want to counter this weapon, scout can outmaneuver the heavy and keep in mind he's limited to his melee so distance is your friend here, if you know the enemy heavy is using this item and you hear him om nom nomming, either rush him and kill him before he can run out or keep you distance and shoot him as he rushes you.

Fists/Boxing Gloves

The Gloves of Running Urgently (GRU)
The first set of boxing gloves on our list, the GRU are similar to the powerjack in that it provides a movement speed increase making him about as fast as a pyro however the gloves holster slower and max health is slowly drained down to 100 health. This weapon's best used in the same way as the powerjack to get to the front lines quicker if your team lacks a teleporter or if you need to get away from a fight that's not going well, however you'll need to be more careful when you pull it out so you aren't left with 2 health in front of the enemy team. Countering this weapon is fairly easy, due to the health drain and the slower holster time if you know the enemy heavy is using these gloves when he shows up on the front lines you can be fairly certain he's got less than 200 health so he should go down fairly easy, and if you catch him with the gloves out you can take advantage of his health draining and the slower holster speed so that he's either forced to switch to a gun which will take longer, or stick with the gloves and almost certainly die.

The Killing Gloves of Boxing (KGB)
A potentially more powerful set of gloves, The KGB give you guaranteed crits for 5 seconds after killing someone with these gloves, the only downside here being a slower firing speed however the crits aren't limited to the gloves. Your best use of these gloves is when you can be certain of a melee kill and use the crits to kill as many people as possible with whatever weapon you choose, the steak can be used here to help guarantee the kill but you're better off with just the gloves imo. Countering this weapon's pretty easy, heavy's the slowest class so unless he's got the steak or the Natascha you should be good, just keep your distance and keep firing.

The Fists of Steel
For when you want to be Iron Man, the Fists of Steel cuts the damage you take from all ranged sources almost by half while they're out, however you also take double damage from melee sources while these gauntlets are out meaning you can die from 2-3 melee swings so going on the offensive with these metal fists isn't recommended, you also will get less overheal and less health from medics while you have them out so make sure your put them away when you're getting healed. Your best use of these Fists of Steel is when you're running away to make sure you don't get mowed down as you run away, just make sure any scouts are dead so they don't catch up and start whacking you. Your best counter to these gauntlets is to pull out your melee if the enemy heavy decides to switch to them, scout is the best counter here since he can catch up with a retreating heavy really easily and the powerjack can also work here too.

The Holiday Punch
The last set of gloves on our list, the Holiday Punch can tickle your enemies on critical hits and will always crit when you hit them from behind regardless of ubercharge, and any enemy heavies also holding these gloves will start laughing when they're hit, however crits do no damage with these mittens. While on the surface these gloves sound useless they share the same taunt as your default fists which if you didn't know, will kill anyone you're aiming at, so you can crit someone with these gloves and then have a guaranteed tauntkill if no one intervenes, they're good for a laugh but don't expect to be very effective with them, if you really need to counter these winter wonderland accessories just watch your back and keep your distance.

The Warrior's Spirit
For when you just can't bear it anymore, the Warrior's Spirit gives a mild damage boost and gives you 50 health on kill with these not-quite-gloves, however you have a 30% damage vulnerability while these bear claws are out. These claws are best used in conjunction with the steak sandvich to boost your melee capabilities as much as possible, however you will need to be a little sneakier when you use them thanks to the damage vulnerability so you don't get shot too much. Countering this weapon's super easy thanks to the damage vulnerability which makes normal rockets do 130 damage, so any enemy heavy with these bear claws out is going to go down pretty quickly, just make sure you keep an eye out for any flankers and you should be ok.

The Eviction Notice
A bit of a weird one, the Eviction Notice is a set of brass knuckles that swings much faster and gives you a speed boost upon hitting an enemy, you'll also get a small movement speed boost while the knuckles are out, however they come with a massive damage penalty and similar health rules to the GRU. This weapon is best used similar to the GRU to run away, they're really only useful when retreating since you can only get the speed boost if you hit an enemy player so you're better off with the GRU imo since you don't have to put yourself right next to the enemy to get the speed boost, if the enemy heavy is using these brass knuckles just treat them like the GRU.

Engineer's Weapons

Despite the arsenals already presented to us, engineer is where the selection starts to get a little more limited, still with the smartest texan around I'm sure we'll find some pretty useful tools.

Shotguns

The Rescue Ranger
An incredibly powerful tool, the Rescue Ranger fires a projectile bolt instead of buckshot which can heal friendly buildings and you can pick up your own buildings from long range for the cost of 100 metal, these pretty powerful upsides are reigned in by a 4 shot clip, halving your primary ammo, you're marked for death while transporting buildings, and a 4:1 health to metal ratio while you're repairing, making it more expensive to repair from range but the ability to do that in the first place can save your sentry from a soldier or demoman. Your best use of this weapon is to keep your buildings maintained from a distance, you can still use this to hit people but it's much harder to land shots thanks to the small projectile size, if an explosive class starts dumping explosives into your sentry you can back up and heal it from range or if you see it's on low health and you're already pretty far away you can right-click your sentry to save it and set up in a different spot, however you'll need to think before you heal or evacuate due to the metal cost for either action. Countering this shotgun is pretty easy, the bolts don't travel too fast so dodging is pretty easy and reflects aren't that hard either however a smart engineer will only be using this gun to repair his buildings so there's a much bigger emphasis on killing him first so he can't repair his sentry.

The Frontier Justice
A powerful offensive weapon, the Frontier Justice gives you revenge crits for sentry kills and assists but only after the sentry is destroyed and you are alive, placing a much bigger emphasis on your survival rather than your sentry's, these guaranteed crits are reigned in by a 3 shot clip, no random crits and any revenge crits not used when you die are lost to the void. This gun's best used in any loadout containing the Gunslinger since despite the low damage output of your mini sentry you can usually get a few assists and/or kills before it's destroyed but this can work with any other wrench too, just make sure you don't stockpile too many revenge crits or you won't be able to use them all before you go down, and be smart about when you use them because it might be fairly difficult to rack up sentry kills again. To counter this weapon's main advantages you'll want to kill the engineer before you take out the sentry so any potential revenge crits are lost, this isn't very hard to do since the gun only has 3 rounds so if he misses even one shot you're most likely safe.

The Widowmaker
Another good offense-oriented weapon, the Widowmaker's ammo pool is your metal pool and on hit, returns metal to your pool based on how much damage you do, it doesn't require any reloads and you do more damage if you are shooting the same target as your sentry, only downside is it uses 30 metal per shot, meaning you can run out of metal pretty quickly if you're not careful. This shotgun rewards you for consistently hitting your shots, if you can keep hitting you can keep shooting and the cycle repeats, this gun's best used in conjunction with the Gunslinger since the mini-sentry only costs 100 metal so you won't use so much ammo setting it up, keeping a pistol as your secondary is still a good idea since you tend to run out of metal fairly quickly. To counter this weapon you'll want to try and dodge the enemy engineer's shotgun blasts and force him to waste ammo, as long as you don't get hit he'll run out fairly quickly, if he's got a sentry set up you'll want to take it out before you deal with the engineer.

The Pomson 6000
The only oddball primary for engineer, the Pomson 6000 is an energy weapon that fires an energy bolt which cannot be deflected similar to the Righteous Bison, it also decreases the medigun charge on the victim as well as invis watch cloak, only downside is a damage reduction vs buildings which you shouldn't really be fighting in the first place. Your best use of this weapon is to deal with an enemy uber push to lessen how much time they have left on the ubercharge or to take away ubercharge before they activate it, it's also a good spy hunting weapon thanks to the cloak drain but the fact that it shoots a projectile ends up making it much harder to use so be careful with your shots. Your best counter to this weapon is dodging, the projectile speed isn't very fast so you can react before the bolt hits you and takes away some ubercharge or cloak meter.

Secondary Utility Items

The Wrangler
A powerful tool, the Wrangler allows you to take control of your sentry and have it shoot where you're aiming at, left-click fires bullets and right-click fires the rockets at a much higher fire rate than if you let the sentry shoot on it's own, wrangled sentries also have a damage shield that massively reduces incoming damage as well as how much health per swing you can give your sentry, upon switching away from the Wrangler the sentry will be shielded and disabled for 3 seconds, obvious downside here is you're giving up your pistol for this item. You can use this item to target enemies outside of your gun's range, however your best use is when a soldier or demoman is targeting your sentry to tank a frankly ridiculous amount of damage, you can also perform sentry jumps but these tend to leave you on 10 health so I wouldn't recommend it unless you're trying to reach a rancho relaxo spot. Your best counter if an enemy engineer is using this item is to kill the engineer first to stop the sentry from shooting at you, and then to take out the sentry while he's dead, while the 3 extra seconds of shielding sounds op in practice it tends to leave the sentry vulnerable once the engineer's dead.

The Short Circuit
For when you need to eat explosives, the Short Circuit is an interesting weapon that similar to the Widowmaker, uses metal for ammo, left-click fires a constant stream of electricity at 5 metal per shot while right-click fires a projectile-destroying ball that travels in a straight line for a good distance until it either hits a surface, player, or it reaches it's limit, this ball costs 65 metal per shot so be careful when you use it, the major downsides here being no random crits and you're trading away your pistol. Your best use of this weapon is when a soldier or demo is giving you trouble, right-click with this item will take away any rockets or grenades but you need to time your shots carefully since with a full metal reserve you only have 3. If you want to counter this weapon pretty much any hitscan weapon will do, or if you can time your rockets just right you can avoid the projectile ball and do damage.

Engineer's Weapons Cont.

Wrenches/Robotic Hands

The Jag
A great utility wrench, the Jag has a faster firing speed and the initial construction speed for buildings is further increased when you hit them with the Jag as opposed to other wrenches, downsides here being a damage penalty, a slower repair rate and another damage penalty vs buildings. This wrench is best used during setup to get your buildings up asap, you can also do the famous Jag Effect rollout which I'll go into when we get to the Eureka Effect, for now once you've got your buildings set up and upgraded you'll want to switch back to the stock wrench so you can heal your buildings faster. To counter this weapon if the enemy engineer is still using it after setup attacking his buildings is far more effective against this wrench thanks to the slower heal speed, once they're dead kill him before he can escape and get another nest set up.

The Eureka Effect
Another good utility wrench, the Eureka Effect has the interesting quality upon pressing R you can choose to teleport to spawn or your exit teleporter which doesn't need to have an active entrance in order to let you teleport, teleporters also cost half as much to build but there are some caveats, your construction speed when hitting your buildings with this wrench is much slower and you get less metal from pickups and dispenser. Your best use of this wrench is in the famous Jag Effect rollout strategy on defense coined by Uncle Dane the engie main, you equip the Eureka Effect and get your teleporters set up in their spots, then you use it to teleport back to spawn, switch to the Jag and start building and upgrading everything to level 3 as fast as possible, if done right you should have a fully upgraded nest before the setup countdown ends, you could also use this wrench to place a sneaky teleporter behind enemy lines and set up a nest without anyone noticing for a little while but you're better off with the Jag Effect strategy imo. If you want to counter this wrench then your best bet is keep watch for enemy teleporters behind your lines and prevent the enemy engineer from getting set up in the first place, if he's using the Jag Effect strategy though he'll already have everything set up when the gates open so the usual sentry busting strategies should work fine here.

The Gunslinger
The perfect offensive tool, the Gunslinger gives you extra max health and a guaranteed crit on the 3rd successful punch in a row, but the main advantage here is the mini-sentry, while you can't upgrade and it doesn't do nearly as much damage, it only costs 100 metal and it builds much faster than the default sentry making it a good tool for placing aggressive sentries, the only other downside here being no random crits with the gunslinger but I think the guaranteed crit on the 3rd punch is powerful enough already. Your best use of this robotic hand is on offense when you need to get a quick defensive spot set up or you need to do a little extra damage/something to distract the enemy with, you can use it on defense and put it in unexpected spots but it's much harder to do area denial with this sentry, making it more important to equip another shotgun like the Frontier Justice or Widowmaker. To counter this weapon of mass server reduction your best bet is to kill the engineer and then destroy his mini-sentry, there'll always be another one later but you can at least prevent him from building more for the time being and killing him also defeats the entire purpose of a loadout with this hand equipped, i.e. keeping the engineer wielding it alive.

The Southern Hospitality
A fairly decent spy tracker, the Southern Hospitality is a wrench that upon hitting a target, makes them bleed for 5 seconds which can be used to help track down a particularly annoying spy, however it has no random crits and a vulnerability to fire damage while it's out. As stated earlier this wrench can help you track down spies since the bleed effect reveals their location but you'll have to get into melee range so be careful when going for the swing. If you want to counter this weapon pyro can be a good choice but only if the enemy engineer likes walking away from his nest with his wrench out, if you're playing spy you can use the fact that he has to get into melee range to trickstab him and then go after his stuff.

Medic's Weapons

As a malicious medical man, medic's arsenal is rather small but also fairly unique in function, let's see what kind of weapons we're dealing with here.

Syringe Guns

The Crusader's Crossbow
For when you want to retake jerusalem, the Crusader's crossbow fires a single bolt that can heal teammates as well as hurt the enemy, and similar to the Flare Gun it will reload itself if you switch to another weapon, besides that it also has much less reserve ammo than the default syringe gun, I know it says it doesn't do headshots but from my experience the syringe gun doesn't do headshots in the first place so idk why it's on there. This weapon is arguably more useful than any of the other syringe guns due to the ability to heal over a much further distance, similar to how the Rescue Ranger can heal buildings over distance but without nearly as many drawbacks, you'll want to practice your crossbow shots on heavies but once you can consistently land them this is the most powerful tool in medic's arsenal. This weapon places a much bigger emphasis on killing any enemy medic wielding it because that health over distance can be incredibly powerful, while the health advantage is great it does reduce the medic's already limited offensive capability so he should be easier to kill if his team can't protect him well enough.

The Blutsauger
A more offense-oriented syringe gun, the Blutsauger (which is German for bloodsucker) rewards you for hitting targets by giving you 3 health per hit, however your own health is drained while the gun is out by 2 health per second so only equip this weapon if you're confident you can lead your targets. Your best use of this weapon can be to do damage in a 'battle medic' loadout or to attempt to out-heal any damage a pyro is doing to you while you're on the retreat, again your health is drained while the weapon is out so only equip it if you can consistently hit your shots with a syringe gun. To counter this weapon a consistent damage output as well as strafing can kill any medic wielding this weapon so while he can fight back he won't last long if you keep dodging and doing damage.

The Overdose
A bit of an oddball weapon, the Overdose's main advantage while it's out is a speed boost based on how much ubercharge you have which can help you get out of tough situations and keep your uber meter up, the downside here being a small damage penalty for the gun. Your best use of this gun is when your heal target dies and there's no teammates nearby to help, switch to this gun and start running, the speed boost may not be much but it can help you get out of bad situations. If you see a medic holding this weapon and he's moving faster than usual then hunt him down because chances are he's got a close to full uber meter and if you can rip that uber advantage away from the enemy team that's a big bonus.

Mediguns

The Kritzkrieg
A damage-dealing alternative to the stock, the Kritzkrieg replaces the stock ubercharge with an uber that grants guaranteed crits to your heal target and increases how fast your uber builds, the only downside here is you're not invulnerable during the uber. Your best use of this medigun is to surprise the enemy team with guaranteed critical damage, you'll want to stay in cover while your heal target runs out and does all the damage, keep in mind that crits do nothing against an enemy sentry so you'll want your stock medigun for that. To counter these guaranteed crits you'll want to flank the enemy medic and kill him when you have the chance, it doesn't matter if he's already ubering with this gun since he's not invincible anymore so flanking him and killing him is the best strategy here.

The Vaccinator
The bane to karens everywhere, the Vaccinator chops up your uber meter into 4 separate charges, and instead of the usual ubercharge this medigun gives you and your heal target a resistance to a certain damage type which is indicated above your health bar as well as above both you and your heal target, this resistance is further boosted upon activating one of the 4 charges, pressing r cycles through resistance types and your uber meter builds much faster, this is reigned in by a much slower overheal rate and a slower ubercharge rate on overhealed patients but it's still faster than stock. Your best use of this medigun is to guard your heal target against incoming damage, you'll have to think fast to anticipate what kind of damage is coming next but in the right hands this can be an incredibly powerful tool. Your best counter here is to switch to a weapon that the medic is currently isn't anticipating for, if he's guarding against bullet damage you can switch to an explosive weapon or to a flamethrower and force him to swap resistance modes, and of course if you can get 2 or more different classes attacking him at the same time both him and his heal target will be almost completely overwhelmed in seconds.

The Quick-Fix
The last medigun on our list, the Quick-Fix boasts a faster heal rate which is further increases during it's ubercharge and any movement impairing effects are nullified during the uber, it's also got a slightly faster ubercharge build rate and it has the unique effect of applying any blast jumps your heal target does to you as well, again downsides here is you aren't invulnerable during the uber and you can't overheal as much as the default medigun. This gun is best used if you find that your heal targets have a nasty habit of dying despite you healing them, the faster heal rate means you can pretty much outheal any damage they're taking but the lack of overheal means unless you're constantly healing someone they won't have the overheal for long. Again your best counter to this medigun is to kill the medic which if he's forced to use this weapon his team's probably not doing a good job of protecting him anyway so chances are you can take away the enemy team's health advantage fairly easily.

Bonesaws

The Ubersaw
Probably the most powerful bonesaw on our list, the Ubersaw simply gives you a quarter of your ubercharge meter every time you hit an opponent, this weapon also has a special taunt kill which will completely fill your uber meter if it connects, the only downside here being a slower firing speed. This weapon's more of a risk vs reward weapon, while the damage dealing capabilities are lackluster the ability to gain ubercharge on hit means you could potentially turn a bad situation into a successful getaway with one hit and a quick swap to your medigun, that being said your best use is as a backup weapon in case someone gets on the flank and tries to kill you to get a bit of uber while taking out the threat. Despite it's potential this weapon is still a melee weapon so treat it like one, keep your distance and keep up the damage, the slower swing speed means if the medic misses it'll take longer to try for another hit giving you an opening to punish the enemy medic for his mistake.

Medic's Weapons Cont.

The Vita-Saw
Another risk vs reward weapon, the Vita-Saw collects organs from people you hit, and each organ saves some of your uber meter upon death, up to 60%, the only downside here is slightly less max health. If you're having a tough time staying alive this is a good weapon to equip, of course you will still need to hit someone to save the uber but saving even 15% of your uber meter can make a huge difference, you'll want to use this weapon similar to the ubersaw but there's less of a penalty for missing now. Again countering this weapon's easy since it's a melee weapon, distance is key here and if the enemy medic's already using this he's probably not the best combatant, but whatever you do don't underestimate your opponents.

The Amputator
A fairly interesting weapon, the Amputator gives and extra 3 health per second on the wearer and right-click/taunting applies a healing effect to nearby teammates, only downside here is a 20% damage penalty. While the healing effect is tempting your medigun does heal faster so unless the entire team is around you you'll only want to use the taunt after an enemy push to heal multiple people at the same time so you aren't left vulnerable in the heat of battle. In all due likelihood an enemy medic won't be using this weapon to attack you but instead be using the taunt to heal his team, it's at this point you'll want to strike and do as much damage as possible while he's stationary and vulnerable.

The Solemn Vow
Probably the least used melee weapon at least in medic's arsenal, the Solemn Vow gives you spy's ability to see enemy health at the cost of a slightly slower firing speed. This weapon's best used to relay the health of enemies to the rest of your team to help them target low health enemies, but unless you have a friend on your team it'll probably go ignored, if you really need to counter this weapon killing the enemy medic is top priority as always.

Sniper's Weapons

A man of precision, the sniper almost always hits his mark, let's take a look at his weapons and see precisely what they do.

Sniper Rifles/Bows

The Bazaar Bargain
A fairly good rifle, the Bazaar Bargain amps up your charge rate for every scoped headshot kill up to 200% letting you get those high damaging shots really quickly, however the base charge rate is halved. This weapon's best used after you've had some practice with sniper and can consistently hit headshots and not die as often, as long as you can keep hitting heads this rifle's basically a direct upgrade to the default rifle. If you want to counter this weapon killing the sniper asap is your best bet, even if you have to charge up a bodyshot to kill him it's still better than letting him run rampant with 5+ heads under his belt, spy's also a good counter as long as he hasn't learned to turn around.

The Sydney Sleeper
An excellent support weapon, the Sydney Sleeper has the unique effect among sniper rifles of covering the enemy you hit in scope in Jarate which makes all incoming damage they take be mini-crits, this Jarate effect lasts up to 5 seconds based on charge level, the rifle's also got a boosted charge rate and scoped headshots do mini-crits instead of crits, the only downside here is no random crits and no regular headshots. Your best use of this weapon is to coat important targets like medics and heavies in Jarate, headshots are still good for doing damage but landing the charged shot is important too. To counter this weapon killing the sniper with another sniper is still a good strategy but if you can get close as any other class he'll go down fairly quickly too, just be smart and use cover where possible.

The Hunstman/The Fortified Compound
A good short-range alternative to the rifle, the Huntsman/Fortified Compound are bows with the Fortified Compound being a reskin of the Huntsman, both fire arrows that are classified as projectiles so they can be reflected but they fly much faster than rockets, holding left click makes the arrow fly further but if the arrow is pulled back for longer than ~5 seconds then the shot will be wildly inaccurate, both can still do headshots but they're easier to hit at medium range imo. Your best use of these weapons is in a more offense-oriented loadout when you're going to be closer to the enemy thanks to the higher FoV, you'll still need to lead your shots a little but if you keep your cool you shouldn't miss too often. To counter this weapon airblast can work but I wouldn't recommend attempting to reflect arrows until you've had a decent amount of time playing as pyro, killing the enemy sniper with another sniper can work fairly well if you can get some distance on him, dodging the arrow as any other class can be done but be wary, the arrow's hitbox is much bigger than you think it is.

The Classic
A bit of a weird one but a good counter-sniper, the Classic allows you to charge up shots even if you're not zoomed, it doesn't do headshots unless you're at full charge and you do less damage on a bodyshot but the increased FoV might be worth it. Your best use of this gun is against enemy snipers since regardless of damage penalty, a fully charged bodyshot can kill any sniper, and the increased FoV means you have a better chance of spotting your target, it's also a bit more effective at closer ranges but I wouldn't go shotgunning with it, similar to the bows medium to long range is this rifle's ideal range. Your best counter to this weapon is proximity, cover, and strafing, relying on sniping isn't as effective against this gun since it's pretty much made to counter snipers but if you can get in shotgun range you can kill him, spy also works the best against this gun since a backstab is an instant kill and he has the tools to get close without getting shot at.

The Hitman's Heatmaker
A bit of an odd weapon that rewards you for helping your team, the Hitman's Heatmaker gives you a focus meter which fills as you get kills and assists, upon pressing R you'll be able to stay scoped in between shots and also get a faster charge rate, it has a bit of a bigger penalty for bodyshots but if you've played sniper for a good while you shouldn't hit those too often. While it is tempting to go for only kills with this gun you build focus through assists too so throwing Jarate at the enemy team can help you gain focus which can be pretty powerful if used right, staying scoped in between shots means you can be more consistent in doing damage and getting kills which fill your focus meter and the cycle repeats as long as there's enemies on the field. Your best counter to this gun is another sniper or spy, if he's in focus he'll be scoped in constantly giving spy an opportunity to strike, he also shoots tracers while in focus telling everyone exactly where he is so your team can seek better cover against him.

The Machina
Another weird gun that's probably the least used on this list, the Machina rewards you for staying scoped in by giving you slightly more damage at full charge and your bullet will go through multiple people at full charge, however this gun cannot fire unless you're using the scope and it always fires tracers. Your best use of this gun is when holding down a chokepoint and you need to be constantly watching an enemy entrance, I wouldn't recommend purposefully going for collateral kills because in practice, the enemy rarely lines up for shots like that in the first place. If you want to counter this weapon try and catch the enemy sniper off guard or get as close as possible, the weapon only fires while scoped so he'll have a hard time hitting you at close range if you keep dodging, spy's also a hard counter here since he'll be scoped in 90% of the time.

SMG/Utility Items

The Jarate
The finest weapon in jar-based karate, Jarate when thrown coats enemies in literal piss which forces them to take mini-crits out of shame, you can use this to put out fires on friendly teammates similar to mad milk and extinguishing teammates reduces the cooldown, only downside here being you're trading away your SMG for this jar o' piss. this item's best used in conjunction with the Bushwacka to coat enemies in Jarate and then rush in with your huge knife to score a guaranteed crit against the coated enemy, it's also pretty good at marking enemy spies similar to mad milk. If you want to counter this lemonade the jar is classified as a projectile which means you can airblast the jar right back at him, you can also wash off the effect in water and charging with demoman's shields removes all debuffs.

Sniper's Weapons Cont.

The Cozy Camper
The first backpack item for sniper, the Cozy Camper provides 4 health per second as well as no flinching when you're hit while fully charged and knockback is reduced slightly while you're aiming, only downside is you're trading away your SMG for this item. This item's best used with the Bazaar Bargain due to the increased recharge rate per head, if you're proficient at sniper you can pretty much guarantee headshots if you're scoped in since even if someone shoots you to try and throw off your aim you won't flinch, helping ensure you hit your target. The best counter for this weapon is spy, the advantages this item provides are only useful if the sniper is scoped in for a good amount of time, even with the Bazaar Bargain at max recharge rate there's still enough time to get close and backstab him before he can see you.

The Razorback
A good anti-spy item, The Razorback is a backpack item that blocks a single backstab attempt which leaves the enemy spy vulnerable for a few seconds, if your shield is broken you can get another one at a resupply locker, obviously you're giving up your SMG for this item and medics won't be able to overheal you while it's equipped. This item's best used if an enemy spy is giving you lots of trouble, if he attempts to backstab you he won't be able to switch weapons for a few seconds giving you an opportunity to kill him, if he's smart he'll try shooting you so take him out fast. Your best counter to this item is another sniper, thanks to the lack of overheal you can guarantee the enemy sniper will have 125 health or less meaning one headshot is enough to kill him, and if you're playing as spy you can use the Ambassador to still guarantee that instant kill.

The Cleaner's Carbine
A more offense-oriented method of guaranteed mini-crits, the Cleaner's Carbine gives you 8 seconds worth of mini-crits which aren't limited to this SMG, the effect activates after filling the charge meter and pressing right-click, damage fills the meter similar to the rage meter for the Buff Banner, however the carbine also has a smaller clip size, a slower firing speed and a lack of random crits. Your best use of this weapon is in conjunction with the Bushwacka similar to Jarate, you just need to fill the charge meter first by doing damage with this weapon which isn't easy to do but you'll be able to get those guaranteed melee crits and shoot fleeing spies. Countering this weapon's similar to the Buff Banner, if you see a sniper running around with it kill him before he has a chance to use the mini-crits.

The Darwin's Danger Shield
An interesting utility item, the Darwin's Danger Shield halves all incoming fire damage and gives you the immunity to afterburn that pyro has, again you're trading away your SMG for this item but the fire resistance might be worth it. This item's best used when an enemy pyro has a nasty habit of shooting you with a flare gun or sneaking up and lighting you on fire, while it doesn't prevent all damage it means you don't have to run back to the resupply locker every time a pyro lands a hit. Your best counter to this item is sniper, spy, or scout, and the usual tactic of using cover is also a good strategy since as with all backpack items for sniper he's trading away close range capability for the buffs the 3 backpacks provide.

Kukris

The Bushwacka
A powerful kukri when paired with the right tool, the Bushwacka crits whenever when it would normally mini-crit, however it doesn't do mini-crits and you take more damage while holding the weapon. This weapon's best used with Jarate to hunt down enemy spies and punish any flankers who try to kill you, you'll always want to keep some jarate on hand so you don't lose the only advantage this kukri has. If you want to counter this weapon distance is your friends here and airblast can reflect the jar back at the enemy sniper robbing him of his crit advantage.

The Shahanshah
Another hard to pronounce weapon, the Shahanshah gives you boosted melee damage if you're below half health, however melee damage is decreased if you have more than half health. Your best use of this weapon, similar to the Equalizer, is to end fights that aren't going well faster thanks to the boosted damage, if the enemy sniper pulls this weapon out it mean he's probably very low on health meaning one good shot will most likely kill him but be wary, this weapon does about 80 damage per swing when boosted so keep an eye on your own health as well.

The Tribalman's Shiv
An okay spy hunting tool, the Tribalman's Shiv makes the target bleed for 6 seconds on hit however it also halves your damage output with your melee, this weapon's best used like the Southern Hosipitality to track down invisible spies however the Jarate and Bushwacka combo is a better spy hunting method imo so I really can't recommend this weapon, if the enemy sniper's using this weapon don't worry too much about getting hit and kill him quickly.

Spy's Weapons

Our resident connoisseur of fine weaponry, the spy has a fairly deadly arsenal in the right hands, let's see what they can do.

Revolvers

The Diamondback
A weapon that heavily rewards you for playing spy well, the Diamondback gives you one guaranteed crit for each building destroyed with a sapper on it as well as backstabs, it does come with a minor damage penalty and no random crits but if you're good at spy these downsides shouldn't affect you too much. This weapon's best used to kill enemies that you have a hard time backstabbing like pyro and scout or if you're too far away from an important target and need to use a ranged weapon, you'll need to get a few backstabs and building kills under your belt but one you do this weapon acts like a far more accurate Frontier Justice. If you want to counter this weapon then similar to the Frontier Justice you'll want to kill the enemy spy before he has a chance to use any crits he's built up, and if you can prevent him from getting backstabs or buildings kills you can take away his only advantage with this weapon.

The Ambassador
A short-range pocket sniper, the Ambassador gives you guaranteed crits on a headshot, however the crits is affected by range, there's a minor damage penalty and a slower firing speed, as well as no random crits. If you wanted to be a more mobile, short-range sniper this weapon's the one for you, you'll have to practice your aim with it since you'll be using it at much closer ranges than a sniper rifle but considering most enemies chase you in a straight line it shouldn't be too much of a problem. If you want to counter this weapon strafing as unpredictably as possible is your best strategy, scout's the most effective here but most classes can throw off the enemy spy's aim if they move right.

The L'etranger
An interesting utility revolver, the L'etranger gives you extra cloaking time and cloak on hit, this does come with a damage penalty but the extra cloak can help immensely. Your best use of this weapon is similar to the stock revolver to help defend yourself when the enemy team is onto you, only this time it can help you escape since you'll get cloak for doing damage so you can confuse the enemy and slip away if you haven't managed to kill them. your best counter to this weapon is to kill the enemy spy before he gets away, pyro is a really good hard counter here since he can keep up with the spy and do consistent damage helping to ensure the kill, as a rule of thumb pyro is the best spy hunter here so if an enemy spy is giving you trouble switch to pyro and be on the lookout.

The Enforcer
A weird weapon but an excellent surprise tool, the Enforcer grants a damage bonus while disguised and attacks with this revolver pierce all damage resistance buffs, but it also has a slower firing speed and no random crits. This weapon's best used while you're disguised and you notice an important target like a medic on about half health, or if the player chasing you has any damage resistance like the Vaccinator resistance buff or the Battalion's Backup, other than that this revolver's not that great. Since this weapon's greatest buff is only available when the spy is disguised if you see a teammate staring at your medic, that's probably a spy lining up a shot with this weapon so spycheck where possible, and while the damage resistance pierce sounds powerful the revolver doesn't do enough damage fast enough to make that much of a difference most of the time but as stated earlier in this guide, don't underestimate your enemy.

Knives

Conniver's Kunai
An incredibly high risk knife, the Conniver's Kunai allows you to absorb the health of your backstab victim, this is offset by a massive reduction to 70 max health, meaning you can pretty much be one-shot by every class with almost every weapon. Your best use of this weapon is when you're so good at spy that you can get behind the enemy without being noticed in the first place, your first target should be an enemy heavy so you get as much overheal as possible in case you do get spotted, after that first kill keep backstabbing the enemy team where possible to keep the health up, the initial risk is huge but in the right hands this can be the most powerful weapon in the game. If you want to counter this weapon good situational awareness is your best friend and having a pyro on spychecking duty can do wonders but whatever you do, don't let him get that first backstab, he'll be much harder to kill when he does so don't give him the chance, check behind you and spycheck everyone you find suspicious.

The Big Earner
Similar concept to the Kunai but not as high risk, the Big Earner gives you cloak when you kill someone with the knife and gives you a speed boost, there's still a max health reduction but it only knocks you down to 100 health as opposed to the measly 70 of the Kunai. This knife is best used in a more hit and run style of play of getting the backstab and using the speed boost to get away as fast as possible, of course if you have the opportunity you can backstab the entire enemy team with this knife incredibly quickly. Again similar to the Kunai your best defense is to keep your head on a swivel and spycheck where possible, it's not as dangerous as the Kunai but don't underestimate what a good spy can do.

The Spy-Cicle
For when you can't seem to shake that one pyro, the Spy-Cicle upon being hit by fire, will give you an immunity for all fire damage for 1 second and afterburn immunity for 10 seconds, however any victims you backstab will turn into ice and the knife is consumed upon activation, recharge time is 15 seconds but you can speed it up by picking up ammo packs. This icicle is best used when there's a pyro on the enemy team keeping watch for spies, this knife can help you get away from him/her but you are losing your instant kill advantage so be sure you have a good revolver to take out the pyro once you've made your getaway. To counter this weapon although heavy is slow moving the minigun can keep track of most spies even if they're invisible as long as you can keep the gun on target and the knife isn't immune to bleeding so weapons like the Boston Basher and the Tribalman's Shiv can help track down a spy with this weapon, and despite being more survivable against pyros you can at least take away the enemy spy's instant kill advantage for a little while and force him to use his revolver.

Spy's Weapons Cont.

The Your Eternal Reward (YER)
An interesting knife/Aladdin reference, the YER allows you take on the disguise of anyone you backstab and there is no attack noise from a backstab, however cloak drain rate is increased and disguising the usual way consumes your full cloak meter and only works if your cloak meter is full, taking away your invisibility advantage for a little while. If your a master of imitation this is the weapon for you, being able to take on the guise of an enemy without the rest of the team knowing can be a very powerful tool but thanks to spychecking this doesn't tend to work for long unless you can blend in well with the enemy team, the increased cloak drain rate means you will have to rely on disguises more often so try and act like the person you are disguised as. the best counter to this weapon is constant spychecking of your friends, it only costs a few rounds and there's no friendly fire so as long as you check behind you every so often and spycheck your teammates you can counter this weapon fairly easily.

Invisibility Watches

The Cloak and Dagger
An interesting utility item, the Cloak and Dagger is a motion-sensitive invisibility watch that only drains your cloak meter when you move while cloaked, after it's fully drained you will be visible to enemy players as if they had bumped into you so keep an eye on the meter, it also has a much faster recharge rate however you cannot take ammo boxes to refill your meter while invisible and you get less cloak meter from the boxes so you end up relying on your recharge rate most of the time. This weapon is best used to hide in a corner and keep watch on the enemy team and relay the positions of important targets to your teammates as well as observe how the enemies move and act so you can blend in more efficiently while disguised, the Big Earner is a good combo with this weapon to help counteract the smaller amount of cloak you get from ammo boxes and make backstabs your source of cloak meter instead. To counter this watch playing as pyro and hosing down corners can force the spy to move which will eventually force him to reveal himself if you keep at it long enough, if you're not a pyro and you know there's an enemy spy around using this watch always spycheck the common spy spots you know to keep him moving and draining his cloak meter.

The Dead Ringer
On the complete opposite end of the spectrum, the Dead Ringer only activates if you have it out and you get shot, upon activation you will leave a fake corpse and fake ammo box as well as immediately turning invisible with both a temporary speed boost and damage resistance, and as a bonus, you won't be revealed when shot at for a few seconds, this consumes half of your cloak meter but the increased cloak duration means it lasts just about as long as the stock invis watch, it also has a faster cloak recharge rate but it's not as fast as the Cloak and Dagger, however the biggest downside is when you decloak, the decloaking sound for the Dead Ringer is much louder than the stock watch so be careful where you decloak. This item is best used to take advantage of seemingly bad situations, if an enemy has figured out you're a spy you can fake your death and get away before the enemy still knows you're alive, you'll need to go pretty far away if you want to avoid being heard decloaking but in most cases it's safe to assume someone heard it and to watch out for anyone hunting spies. If you want to counter this weapon you can tell if someone is using it by picking up the ammo box and seeing if your weapon ammo or metal goes up, if it doesn't then you know there's still a spy out there and to keep an eye out.

Sapper

The Red Tape Recorder
The only current alternative to stock that has a difference in gameplay, the Red Tape Recorder reverses the enemy building construction meaning placing this sapper on an enemy building will take from level 3 to level 2, then to 1 and eventually after going through the initial build animation, destroys the building, it doesn't do damage to the building like the stock sapper does but taking a sentry from level 3 to level 2 can give the rest of your team a huge advantage. This sapper is best used when your team is about to go up against the enemy sentry and to make the enemy engineer sad, taking the sentry from level 3 to level 2 reduces it's firepower by a significant margin so even if he can get the sapper off he's still stuck with a level 2 sentry which can be destroyed a lot easier without needing an uber push unless your team is really bad, it works slower than the stock sapper though so if you're looking to destroy buildings with this sapper equipped you'll want to use your revolver or knife, still taking buildings from level 3 to level 2 does mean they'll momentarily be less effective and force the engineer to pour another 200 metal into each building sapped to get them back up to max efficiency, hence this weapon making engineers sad. If you want to counter this weapon killing the spy before he can sap anything is the best strategy however if you can remove the sapper fast enough your building can remain at level 3 so the stock wrench and good situational awareness can counter this sapper really well, oh and pyro with the homewrecker can help too.

Multiclass Weapons/Items

These items can be used by any of the relevant classes shown in the screenshots however they tend to be more effective on some classes than others.

Shotguns

The Panic Attack
The perfect emergency shotgun, the Panic Attack is usable by every class that can equip a shotgun, Soldier, Pyro, Heavy and Engineer can all equip it but it is admittedly not as useful on engineer as the other classes thanks to it being a backup weapon whereas engineer uses it as a primary weapon but I could see it used in some interesting battle engie loadouts, this shotgun shoots more bullets per shot like the Force-a-Nature and deploys faster like the Degreaser, and most importantly it fires in a fixed, wide shot pattern meaning all of your shots are mostly down to skill, however it doesn't do as much damage as the stock and firing several shots in a row makes those shots less accurate. Like I said earlier all of these qualities make this weapon the perfect backup weapon for most classes however it's best used on pyro in my opinion since pyro is already a close range class partially nullifying the less accurate shots and being able to follow up a spray of fire with a quick shotgun blast or 2 is very powerful. To counter this weapon you'll want to stay at medium range, the wide shot pattern means this gun becomes much less effective if you back up so if you stay at a distance this weapon can only do about as much damage as the stock scattergun from the same range, still the ability to quickly switch means an enemy can close in firing their primary, swap and finish you off with a shotgun blast if you're not careful.

The Reserve Shooter
An interesting shotgun, the Reserve Shooter is usable by Soldier and Pyro only however soldier tends to get more use out of it than pyro, this shotgun scores guaranteed mini-crits against targets launched airborne by explosives, grappling hooks and rocket packs and it deploys a little faster but not as fast as the Panic Attack, however this shotgun only has 4 shots so use them wisely. This weapon's best used on soldier with most of the rocket launchers to blast a target skyward and then score a free mini-crit if you hit them mid-air, it's fairly difficult to execute and the mini-crit doesn't do that much damage so I'd advise using a different shotgun. If you want to counter this weapon then try not to jump while a soldier is shooting rockets at you so you don't get launched off the ground too far, thus nullifying this weapon's main advantage.

Utility Items/Melee Weapons

The B.A.S.E. Jumper
A good blast jumping utility, the B.A.S.E. Jumper allows you to deploy a parachute mid-air by pressing the jump key, this slows your fall and gives you a little more air control albeit not much, it can be used by soldier in the secondary slot and demoman in the primary slot although soldier tends to get more use out of it thanks to the Airstrike. This item's best used on soldier in conjunction with the airstrike to rain rockets from above but I can see it being used on demoman to rain stickybombs as well, despite the slightly better air control this item does leave you vulnerable to snipers while it's deployed but you can try to dodge headshots by undeploying and redeploying the parachute by pressing jump twice in quick succession, you will lose a little altitude but you won't be dead and that's a massive bonus. Your best counter to this weapon is sniper and/or a Natascha heavy, the Natascha can slow down any soldier or demo using this item and leave him even more vulnerable to the rest of your team, sniper included.

The Half-Zatoichi
An interesting melee weapon, the Half-Zatoichi can be equipped by both soldier and demoman however it tends to get more use on demo thanks to the demoknight sub-class but the recent meme of crusader soldier has brought it into the joke weapon realm for soldier, the weapon itself grants half of your base health on kill which can translate to overheal, meaning if you can get consistent kills this weapon can make you nearly immortal, it's power is reigned in by a lack of random crits and if you put it away before you get a kill you deal 50 damage to yourself, and if you run into an enemy player wielding this weapon whoever lands the first hit scores an instant kill regardless of how much overheal you both have. As stated before this weapon is best used on demoknight thanks to the melee boosts you get from the demoknight loadout however you'll want to be cautious when going up against a soldier or demo wielding this weapon since it's an instant kill if either of you land a blow on the other, otherwise feel free to slice and dice your opponents as usual. Again you know the song and dance by now, keep your distance and keep shooting until the demoknight's dead, airblast can help but the extended melee range on large melee weapons means he can still get a hit in even if you time it right so be careful.

The Pain Train
A bit of an all-round useless melee weapon, the Pain Train is usable on both soldier and demoman, all it does is give you the same capture rate as a scout at the cost of a minor damage vulnerability vs bullets, and since you're already big targets for bullet-based classes you tend to get mowed down much easier while this weapon's out. I guess this weapon's best use is to trick the enemy into thinking there's a scout on the point and surprise them with a rocket/grenade to the face but other than that it's pretty much useless. If you run into an enemy wielding this weapon just shoot him with a shotgun or something, he'll die pretty quickly.

Personal Loadouts

Before we end things off I want to show my personal favorite loadouts and go through the gameplay theory behind them, keep in mind that my playstyle may be very different from yours so I encourage you to experiment on your own and find out what weapons you like and which ones you find not as useful, but if you need a starting point you can take a look at what I've got equipped below and try that out for yourself, also despite the fact I've only covered non-stock weapons here, sometimes stock is more effective then the weapon options we've gone over.

Scout

While the Force-a-Nature is very powerful I find the stock scattergun to be more consistent in damage output, despite having 3.5k+ hours my aim with hitscan weapons isn't great so having 4 extra shots really helps, I've got mad milk so I'm not entirely useless to my team and because scout's really good at catching up to spies and throwing some mad milk down helps track them down fairly easily, I've also got a pan on melee because I find the other melee options a bit lackluster and also because LOUD NOISES.

Soldier

For soldier I've got the stock launcher because again, I find the damage output to be more consistent with the stock but I'll break out the direct hit if I end up running into a sentry nest, also using the stock shotgun because the 4 rockets in the clip tend to go pretty fast so I like having a backup weapon, don't have the Panic Attack here because I tend to stay a little further back with the shotgun on soldier than the range the Panic Attack is effective at so stock is a bit more reliable here, and finally I've got the Escape Plan to run and get some health after the fight is over.

Pyro

Admittedly I did borrow this loadout from LazyPurple but I find it works really well for me, I've got the Degreaser for the faster weapon swap and the Panic Attack for an incredibly fast follow-up shot after I've lit a target on fire, some pyro mains will yell at me for not having the Flare Gun but the flare gun does next to nothing against enemy pyros and I'm close enough with the Degreaser anyway that the Panic Attack is pretty useful in most situations, and of course I've got the Powerjack on melee to get around faster since I don't have the jetpack in this loadout.

Demo

Pretty much all stock here on demo since I find the damage output to be more consistent but one of these days I'll have to learn how to use the loose cannon properly since you can do a lot of damage with it if you time your shots right, but for now it's shooting grenades over hills and setting traps for the enemy team, and I've got the pan here too, while the melee options are appealing they take longer to draw and in a panic situation when I've got enemies closing in on me time is what I don't have so pan it is, also I find the taunt with the pan on demo humorous.

Heavy

On heavy I got the Tomislav in the primary slot since I find to damage output to be more consistent at range and also because I find that I can make snipers panic and retreat if I land a few shots keeping me out of danger of being headshot, Sandvich is an obvious choice here because I like my medic and I'd rather he stay alive thank you very much, I'll swap to the Second Banana if there isn't a medic but there usually is so I keep this lunch box on hand, and again I've got the pan because I find that the GRU get me killed more often than not so pan it is.

Engineer

For Engineer I've got 2 separate loadouts, one for defense and one for offense, my defense-oriented loadout consists of the rescue ranger for the health over distance, the wrangler to tank extra damage, and a situational wrench, usually I'll have the jag for setup and sometimes use the jag-effect rollout strategy but for the most of the time it's the stock wrench for more health per swing. For my offense-oriented loadout, aka battle-engie, I've got the widowmaker for the consistent damage output, the pistol for when I run out of metal, and the gunslinger for the lower-cost mini-sentry.

Medic

For our resident doctor I've got the Crusader's Crossbow for that health over distance advantage, stock medigun because being invulnerable tends to be much more valuable than the other types of ubercharge the other mediguns provide, however if my team's doing poorly I will switch to the quick fix to try and at least keep them alive, and if I'm on defense I'll swap to the Kritzkrieg for the extra damage output, also have the Ubersaw for obvious reasons.

Sniper

Despite me talking about his weapons I'm still really bad at sniper, steadily improving but it is slow going which is why I stick with the stock rifle instead of the Bazaar Bargain to try and get a feel for how to play sniper, I've also got the Jarate and Bushwacka combo for hunting spies who dare think they can sneak up on me, my recommendation for sniper on this type of loadout is to not stay scoped in for too long, at the very least periodically unscope and check behind you for spies.

Spy

Probably my least played class, it's pretty much all stock here except for the watch which is the Cloak and Dagger, I like to play spy a bit more methodically but I tend to get killed a lot and end up switching to a more familiar class, spy relies heavily on tricking the enemy and getting into their heads which is something I just can't seem to do so I really don't have many good tips here.

Conclusion

I hope this guide helped you out in some small way and gave you an insight into the different weapons the game has to offer, I may have missed a few reskins here and there but the weapons presented here are the ones you'll most likely run into on the battlefield, in any case I hope I helped you on your journey through this crazy game and good luck out there!

Other TF2 Guides I've Done

TF2 Basics
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2070902568

[Some Random Dude]

well, I say made but I pretty much stole it from Lazypurple lol

[Some Random Dude]

@ynp22333 Eh, it was no contest back in the day when I first made that loadout but now I think the other weapons have more of a shot, just depends on how you play

[ynp22333]

So you're saying that The Gas Jockey's Gear weapons are the best pyro weapons. You could probably use Attendand hat for full set to leave a cool gravestone on reckted players