Bing Soy's TF2 Strategy Information

Various information related to TF2 (casual) gaming by Bing Soy. Items, subclasses, techniques, etc.
If you're looking for various ways to spice up the game, welcome. If you're new but want to figure out stuff on your own but need a little push in the right direction, click here for beginner stuff or here for other guides.
More information & guide structure yet to be improved over time.
If you play competitive, read whatever rules applicable as things listed here may be illegal to a specific league.

Bing Soy/Guide Context

Context for guide, bias, who for, who write, etc.:

• Bing Soy is a casual TF2 player (not competitive).
  
• He usually plays solo with a not-too-focused approach on teamwork/objectives/co-ordination (i.e., casually).
  
• He usually tries various/new/creative/difficult/technical methods to frag in the game as opposed to finding the most ideal strategy for the maximum amount of kills. This helps keep the game challenging/worth playing (long-time players should try this).
  
• Bing Soy doesn't usually play in servers that have random crits (includes Valve's casual servers - used to play but quit). Random crits make the game inconsistent in a bad way. Your kills should be earned from mechanical skill and (at least minimally) sound decision making. Being rewarded with a frag from using your brain is not only great for making the game more fair for both sides, but also great for making you smarter with decision making in general.
  The journey to the frag is much more fulfilling than an impersonal/cold/inhuman random crit. Like a nutritious, wholesome chicken salad wrap to the high-caloric, nutrient deficient chocolate cake.
  Play how you want, but do try to change things up once in a while. Who knows, maybe a habit to look at things differently, actively challenging yourself to become better may rub off in more areas in your life other than TF2.

Guide is probably not best for competitive players who don't want to stray from well-established metas/don't want to make teammates angry.
Guide focuses on various playstyles/techniques/mindsets, teamwork and objectives; not so much about how to "win" the game specifically, you should aim to "win" but the journey is much more important – going through the journey could be your "win".
Might be hard to follow due to compounding info and overall questionable structure/coherence. Will try over time to make it more efficient to read, but the information comes first. Don't want to dumb it down too much, focusing more on perfect structure rather than the meat and potatoes. Maybe you will become smarter trying to figure out what value you can extract from this.

Maybe this "guide" can help prolong your TF2 experience or just somehow help you in some way.
Bing Soy won't/can't force you to do anything, this isn't a guide you shouldn't feel obligated follow to the letter, it's information Bing Soy documents, which can serve you. Something about showing you the door.

If you feel like this guide is too daunting or it feels more like homework or want to derive fun/fulfilment from figuring out stuff on your own, then don't read on or come back later. Guide is tool. Not legal document. You probably get the point now.

Legend

⛰️ = ok strategy
☯️ = situational strategy
⚠️ = dumb/non-advised/handicap/meme strategy
♿ = handicap (self-imposed restriction intended to make game harder/more challenging - consider this when going against less skilled players or if you're too good as to level the playing field, keep it challenging or fun for both sides)=

new (old phase out)
⛰️ = Solid strategy
🎴 = Situational strategy
⚠️ = Not recommended strategy
✨ = Style strategy
♿ = Handicap strategy
☢️ = Last resort

🔨 = style/technique (switch between various styles/techniques, water)

using Hammer units (Hu) for movement speeds
https://wiki.teamfortress.com/wiki/Classes#Speed

overall document structure being revised

✨ Passive ability: Tied to the class, not necessarily the weapon. Example, spy's ability to use enemy teles are tied to him but the knife's backstab is tied to the knife itself.

General

• Running away
  
• Deciding how to play your hand
  
• Team morale and your morale
  
• Water
  
• Remember, it's a game, no need to take too seriously, have fun.
  A game should serve you, whether as a respite from a stressful day of work/school or to act as a puzzle/decision-making game/simulation to make yourself smarter or to socialize in virtual space (esp. when other places aren't suitable).
  
• Check your posture, back pain is not good for gaming/life
  
• Play other games and/or engage in life activities, can possibly have transferable knowledge for TF2 gaming and vice versa
  
• Lateral thinking/be creative, find what works. Do this at whatever pace you'd like (be careful of the environment you are playing, competitive players may kick you for "ruining" their game, when you know what you're doing is trying new things + to be fun for you and others – find a balance, find a good server/environment that isn't too strict about being different, do the objective to do your part for the team where applicable).

There is some grey area about unintended usage of game mechanics such as phlog cancel or getting stuck on walls. I like the unintended things that add to the gameplay/inconvenience you more than enemy, rather than make things more one-sided/unfair. If there's a certain unintended strategy I do that's too unethical, tell me (somehow). Would be cool to have certain things left in the game like phlog cancelling to add dimension to phlog pyro, maybe have the phlog bar reduced a lot if you do successful phlog cancel for balance while keeping that additional gameplay element. Something like building 1-way sentries using exploits to get outside map for unfair advantage/effectively cheating is not an unintended thing I like. Something like hiding in a destructable barrel prop is more something I can get behind.

respawn spectate time not only for processing your mistakes, you can see enemy and ally positions
there are some fixed camera angles to toggle between usually in key areas like points or a following camera on the cart or your allies
see how your team is doing, observe roles

1. Scout 👟

Base stats

💼 Base roles: Offense, picks
➕ Base Health: 125 HP (185 HP overheal)
🥾 Base speed: 400 Hu/s
✨ Passive ability: Double jump

• ⛰️ Stock scout
  
  • Tried and true, simple and effective
    
  • Versatile - offensive, flanking, picks, etc.
    
• ☯️ Bonk scout
  
  • Force-A-Nature + Bonk! Atomic Punch + Fan O'War
    
  • Distract enemy team, play normally, do whatever, flank, destroy/camp teleporters
    
  • 🔨 "Bombk" scout: When you initiate/time your attack as soon as your bonk runs out.
    
    • Position yourself as close as you can and hold fire button to instantly, try to get a kill in 2 shots or lower, especially when surrounded by enemy team, choose your pick wisely
      
    • You can try bombking an engineer's building if the situation calls for it; if you don't destroy it, you still would have distracted it if you co-ordinated your attack
      
    • Hit enemy if possible with fan risk for chance for instant/faster kill (esp. against light classes), this does sacrifice valuable milliseconds due to switch speed
      
    • Can use world viewmodel options to trade the first person vision for possibly better bombk aim, Bing Soy prefers the default thirdperson (vision + harder to aim)
      
      • bind KEY "bodytoggle"
        alias bodytoggle "toggle cl_first_person_uses_world_model 0 1; play ui/credits_updated"
        bind KEY "taunttoggle"
        
      • alias taunttoggle "toggle tf_taunt_first_person 0 1; play ui/cyoa_map_close"
        
• ⚠️ Bleed melee scout
  
  • Force-A-Nature + Crit-A-Cola + Boston Basher
    
  • FaN jump + Basher jump
    
  • Soda Popper + Boston Basher, harder challenge to utilize hype for basher jump for dumb kill

backscatter
- spy techniques(?)

bonk silencer thing (ty λlex for confirm)
- equip bonk (or cola), when shooting scattergun, immediately switch to bonk to supress gun sound, and immediately back, find rhythm
- sniping applications? make it harder to find your location? (bullet tracers still may give you away)
- cause confusion? useless? purely a handicap? any benefit?
- more testing needed
- wrap assassin seems to work too as silencer
- same principle/sound coding thing as silencing pyro det shots with melee?
- to do: expand this, other classes do this too, old knowledge? expand?

2. Soldier 🚀

Base stats

💼 Roles: Offensive, Defensive
➕ Health: 200 HP (300 HP overheal)
🥾 Speed: 240 Hu/s
✨ Passive ability: 40% blast damage resistance from rocket jumps

Main perks: Firepower
Main weakness:

(reformat)

⛰️Stock soldier/variants (shotgun)

A classic, great for all skill levels
Base Loadout: [Any] + [Any Shotgun] + [Any]

• Good for beginners to learn fundamentals of game (weapon switching, effective damage ranges), especially beginner rocket jumpers

⛰️Gunboat soldier

Jumping, retreating, rinse & repeat
Base Loadout: [Not rocket jumper] + Gunboats + [Any]

• Sustained mobility - very nice. Rollout quicker, close distance quicker, retreat quicker. Movement is a very big deal in this game, naturally anything modifying movement speed is huge.
  
• The blast jump resistance can be good incentive for you to just jump everywhere, passively learning maps and hp/ammo spots, can be useful to make stock soldier gaming less disastrous since you can compensate lack of gunboats with map knowledge.
  
• Close range rockets are safer to fire (damage you less), less likely to die to own explosion from that pesky spy butter-knifing you, make sure to crouch jump so the shot counts as a rocket jump for the damage reduction
  
• Disciplinary Action - team support for faster rollout/help retreat/aggresive push, your heavy will like this
  
• Escape Plan - escape, build uber, harder to melee in a melee battle, situational taunt kill
  
• Can be a part time trolldier and occasionally mix in some gardening with rockets, see below for more gardening info

☯️Trolldier/market gardening general

Base Loadout: Rocket Jumper + [Any] + Market Gardener

• Mantreads can help knockback interfere with you less, meaning less adjustment needed to compensate for market gardens
  Alternatively, without Mantreads you can use enemy knockback to your advantage by air-strafing for extra distance/control
  
• B.A.S.E. Jumper can be sometimes used for more unexpected gardening
  
• Can be an ok counterpick for troublesome Vaccinator medics, you will probably draw more enemy fire once they realize your antics, can be good or a bad
  
• For an added challenge, do different jump techniques such as pogoing, walljumps, sync jumps when gardening, go practice at jump maps to take your trolldier to the next level
  
• Bunnyhopping (bhop) - technique to trick game into thinking you're airbourne, meaning market garden crits even when "touching" ground – see below video
  
  • Recommended bind: bind MWHEELDOWN +jump
    
  • retry in console to reconnect server if bhop not working
    
  • Possible to kill unsuspecting/off-guard heavy/overhealed/multiple enemies with consecutive bhop mgs
    
  • Rocket Jumper's whoosh sound - the whooshing sound can help you indicate that you are still in a "mid-air" state.
    Sometimes this may fail and you may be still be bhopping despite lack of whoosh, try to go for swing anyway.
    To be sure, any rocket launcher can give you bhops, the rocketjumper just helps with an aural cue.
  https://youtu.be/6Z1pOMVegE8
  
  

  Variants

  Spice it up
  

  Classic Trolldier

  Rocket Jumper + Mantreads + Market Gardener
  An art more appreciated once you try it
  
  • Try to get a precise stomp + mg crit on a heavy to effectively "one-shot" them
  [/i]
  
• You can "brute-force" mantread damage by intentionally aiming a rocket so your descent is greatly accelerated into an unlucky target

Shotgun Trolldier/(smart pun) Scout

Rocket Jumper + [Shotgun] + Market Gardener

You could deal at least 5 damage to a normal soldier (200hp) mid-air then switch just in time to get the market garden

Or miss then market garden and finish off your target with your shotgun

Or maybe get a fat point-blank meat shot while bhopping then market gardening as the coup de grâce[www.thefreedictionary.com]

• Hmm

♿ Nerfed Trolldier

Rocket Jumper + Gunboats + Market Gardener
Acute Ekrixi-Catapeda-Algo-phobia

• no bonus turning/stomp from mantreads (useless secondary), normal soldier strafe turning speed
  
• could be good way to get good at situational market gardens for non-trolldier/mantread gaming

Tank Trolldier

Rocket Jumper + Battalion's Backup + Market Gardener
Trolldier universe

• No mantreads means no knockback resistance, meaning you will have an easier time surfing enemy explosives/bullets
  
• Find good chances to eat enemy explosives so you can surf them and get an MG (enemy might wise up to this, keep them guessing)
  
• Battalion's Backup makes it so you can probably tank one more rocket or high damaging shot; a few vital milliseconds where you could to a funny frag

Whip soldier/Jockey

Support, heavy will like this
Base Loadout: [Any] + [Any] + Disciplinary Action

• Rollout entire team faster, help retreats/pushes, decide whether to output damage or speed up a teammate
  
• Slightly more range than Demoman's Eyelander, possibly better chance at winning melee duels despite reduced damage

Variants

Probably less close to conventional soldier and closer to a medic but for speed and sometimes L4D2 jockey

⚠️Regen Jockey

Rocket Jumper + Concheror + Disciplinary Action

• more supportive focus, catch up with teammates without blast damage to whip them more frequently
  
• try to get some damage in, finish off retreating enemies, get in enemies' face/latch on to them to distract them so your team can mount an attack
  
• Your only damage is your melee, compensate by taking note of how you can utilize your health pool, you can still be of use by being a meat shield, tanking for your teammates
  
• AOE speedboost + regen if you chip down enemies and somehow survive
  
• doesn't stack with Disciplinary Action

Cow Mangler
- parachute can help you retain decent speed to advance and close into target, can airstrafe to dodge stuff

airstrike buffbanner
- pair with bhops
- minicrit barrage
- can switch to para later

airstrike
- sync jump stuff

3. Pyro 🔥

Base stats

💼 Roles: Various – defensive, support, disruption
➕ Health: 175 HP (260 HP overheal)
🥾 Speed: 300 Hu/s
✨ Passive ability: Afterburn negation

Main weaknesses:
Strong against: Spy, Medic
Weak against: Sniper, Scout, Engineer's Sentry

Utilitarian
You can dynamically take on a variety of roles according to the situation. Like the medic, you exceed in supporting the team.

Examples:

• helping push the cart, reflect projectiles
  
• watching your medic's back
  
• general spy-checking
  
• engie nest defense
  
• deter flankers/spies with your presence

General notes

- puff-n-sting combo
- switch from primary if you need to stand very close to a corner/wall - flamethrower sticks out, giving you away, or look directly up to hide flamethrower if switch speed will be too slow for your attack
- reflect explosives, to harm or to jump. Jump is powerful but damages you.
- poorly positioned sentries

Pyroshark/Neon
Hungry
- blast into water then consume prey
- hide in/around water
- detonator and thruster for more mobility, hold space in water to skip like flat stone
- Airblast prey into water
- If willing teammates you can landshark with milk or jars.

stock pyro

detonator pyro
- jump, dodge
- get to know maps better, health pack locations, jump more
- open up more aggressive axtinguisher opportunities
- 5 Ds of detonator.
--Dodge: dodge threats like projectiles, charging demomen, trains
--Dip: dip yourself into danger but don't stay too long or you die, lure your enemies, look for opportunities
--Duck: to jump further, you must not only jump, but duck at the same time
--Dive: dive into enemy when you see a good opening to engage with them
--Dodge: see dodge

flare pyro
- puff, airblast to prop up enemy for flare shot easier flare shot, scouts slippery may need to be quick/delay in anticipation of double jump, maybe soldier near wall as they can free selves from your grasp
- flare jump, hug a flush map aligned wall, face wall, aim slightly left with low vertical deviation on your y rotation, practice and find the angles. this is small jump, can probably find spots. can also be slightly better than normal jump if you need the extra situational speed.
(learned this from a VAVLIE TF2 video forgot which one or maybe deleted)

thrust pyro
- 2 max charge, 15sec recharge per charge. can active second charge as soon as you land from previous thrust.
- plan your trajectory, be prepared to change course if needed
- ignite+stomp+axting combo for a burst of hi-dmg to single enemy, may need additional damage to follow up if heavier class

being pybro, not only to engies
- airblasting projectiles away from buildings/teammates
- airblasting enemies into/away from friendly sentries
- make up for your limited range capability by looking out for your teammates, being aware of possibly important details in battle so you can capitilize on your strengths
- protecting teammates, especially medics
- extinguishing burning teammates, free health, and free crits if you use manmelter
- homewrecker/neon annihilator to remove spy sappers

Phlog Pyro

• Only fire weapons can build Mmmph (shotguns and non volcano fragment melees are out)
  
• Ideally, you'd want to be alive by the time you get full Mmmph,
  
• Phlog canceling: higher risk, more challenging technique to add to your phlog gameplay. You can potentially get 2 seconds of uber which you would normally be stunlocked by the taunt and can instantly attack while having that short invuln meaning 2 seconds more of phlog time.
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cl1zR70xXrg

- try be more aggressive, objective, not in the back shooting scorch then only joining main battle to phlog
- you can introduce some mindgames by taunting at certain moments to bait an enemy reaction, even adding fear, uncertainty and doubt as to when you will actually Mmmph.

"Ethical" phlog tips

• Use backscratcher to nerf healing and deter pocketing.
  
• Request not to be pocketed/ubered.
  
• Make an effort to not spawncamp (if happen to be near spawn then bad luck for enemy)
  
• Only use sharpened volcano fragment fire damage to fuel phlog

trolldier pyro
thrust and axting
puffnsting

more resouces
VAVLIE TF2 pyro jumping
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCeQcliRzlVN4f6eRePQl8WQ

4. Demoman 💣

Base stats

💼 Roles: Offensive, Defensive
➕ Health: 175 HP (260 HP overheal)
🥾 Speed: 280 Hu/s
✨ Passive ability: None

Power class

---

Caber things:

General caber things:

• Caber damage: 75-83 explosive damage + 55 melee
  
• Vaccinator medics with explosive resistance can reduce the explosive damage the caber produces
  
• Jump with the caber, combine with normal charge or trimp or pill jump for more jump potential
  
• Try to finish off your target mid-air with a pill or a stickybomb

• ☯️⚠️Caberknight
  
  • Tide Turner: Charge control, more trimping potential
    
  • Splendid Screen: Crit damage, more charging, more bash damage
    
  • Chargin' Targe: More sustain, crit damage
    
  • Make the caber swing count, once you pop it, your damage output will suffer especially without a grenade launcher
    
  • Charge combo: Splendid screen bash 85+ Caber expl crit-225 melee crit- 165=475, the explosive damage can splash and kill close by enemies.
    If you manage to have all this damage hit a single target, you can drop a heavy and possibly a fully over-healed one
    If you need to charge a crowd, try to do so in a way that you can at least get a caber hit before death (wait for distraction, backs turned, corners, etc.)
• ☯️Caber gardener / Caber bomber
  
  • Sticky Jumper: Jumping easier, can have more tries to caber in one life, go crazy with the jumps
    
  • Stock Stickybomb Launcher: For the more conventional demoman who'd likes to occasionally garden, can finish off caber target
    
  • Grenade launchers: Same as above reason + more challenging
    
  • Quickiebomb launcher: Butter up enemies while you jump at them then finish them off with caber or vice versa
    
  • Booties/Bootlegger: More HP to buy you some milliseconds, might help with followup hits if you insist on purely damaging with caber
    
  • B.A.S.E. Jumper: Can throw off enemies, especially if they aren't looking up. More control, choose when to drop

---

Demoknights

Going medieval
General knight things:

• Boots and/or Scotsman's Skullcutter will make charging slightly slower, meaning slower arrival and slightly less distance.

• ⛰️Eyelander demoknight
  
  • Eyelander+shield+boots=become a nuisance for enemy team with your speed and extra shield damage, know when to engage and when to run away to preserve your head(s)
    
  • -25 initial health, your start or your head-collecting snowball may be harder
• ⛰️Axe knight / Executioner
  
  • Scotsman's Skullcutter+splendid screen = potential to quickly kill non-overhealed heavy or overhealed non-heavy class (Splendid screen bash 85+melee charge crit 234=319 potential dmg)
    
  • Burst single target damage, make picks
    
  • The extra damage can help with enemies with more HP/overheal, could mean 1 less swing to get a kill

⛰️Hybrid knight

• Grenade launcher + Any Shield + Any Melee
  
• Makes you more rounded, knight-ability may suffer but don't let it stop you
  
• Iron Bomber
  
• Tide Turner for superior turning ability, is good since not wearing boots
  
• Splendid Screen/Chargin' Targe turning rate will be not so nice, but is cost of having grenade launcher
  
• ⚠️ Iron Bomber + Tide Turner + Persian Persuader: High mobility, low ammo

Persian Knight

• Persian Persuader+shield for frequent charging at cost of lowered max ammo, boots
  
• Boots where necessary if don't want to hybrid
  
• Hold right click to keep charging if needed when running over ammo boxes mid-charge or getting a kill with the bash

---

Sticky

Sticky
General sticky things:

• Sticky

Techies / Trapper

• Scottish Resistance excels with this
  
• Use map to your advantage, find spots that hide/obscure your stickies, even buildings can hide stickies
  
• Use teammates as advantage, they can act as bait for enemies
  
• Guard multiple points of entry
  
• Get kills out of your vision (harder)
  
• Not recommended: use own body to obscure stickies

Sticky spam

• Stock Stickybomb Launcher for max DPS
  
• Forces enemy team to play around you more than you them (similar to hitscan sniper)
  
• Quickiebomb launcher to trade overall DPS for more range+faster detonation
  
• Great for beginners and competitive players who want kills

Additional notes:

• You cannot detonate your stickies while swinging your melee. Remember this when in sticky-melee combat.
  
• Pill jumping, easiest with Iron Bomber. Also overload jumping with Loose Cannon. Can combine with charge.
  
• Demoman speed/rollout potential (Hihg speed): https://youtu.be/NYma6tXnQQs
  
• How to trimp: https://youtu.be/9qZvZPa_nNg

5. Heavy ⛰️

Base stats

💼 Roles: Offensive, Defensive
➕ Health: 300 HP (450 HP overheal)
🥾 Speed: 230 Hu/s
✨ Passive abilities: None

Main perks: Large HP pool
Main weakness: Slow speed

The slowest class
Because of your slow movespeed, your positioning decisions matter much more.

Loadouts

Heavy: Steel-Shotgun Heavy

Steel Heavy Walk/Mann of Steel/[catchy name]

Essentially "fat scout" but you keep your fists up most of the time
Minigun of choice, The Panic Attack, Fists of Steel
Be meatbag for team with fists of steel, draw fire from enemy snipers - can survive multiple quickscopes or a fully charged non-Machina headshot (450 * 0.6 = 270)
Flank
Huo Long at opportuned moments, hide around corners/drop down, hit them with fire+bullets.
Tomislav for stealth ambush.
Learn more advanced weapon switching (knowing when to swap, keeping track of enemy clip/which weapon they are holding – bypass holster penalty by swapping to weapon [A] then desired weapon quickly, etc)
Beware matadoring spies - looking at the spy doesn't stop backstab as your in-game model rotation is kind of delayed. Shoot at them and choose whether to pursue or flee.

https://youtu.be/ytQ5CYE1VZw

Spoovy ⚠️✨♿

A worse spy with extra steps
Holiday Punch
Stealth gameplay, find corners and places to catch enemies with their back turned. Steak may help you catch up better but will make you more noticable and limit you to melee.
Recommended to not exclusively spoove to be more useful to team

Not recommended for long periods
Objectively worse spy. No cloak, not spy speed.
Buffalo steak and festive punch. Punch the back make laugh then finger gun.
Finger gun where necessary.
Feel free to attempt backstabbing techniques.

"mobility"(?) bhop thing
tomislav (+ panic attack + the fists of steel)
bunnyhop your way around the map, unleash tomislav at moments notice, keep wm1+canceling until you see enemy and blast (more testing required)

Heavy's lunchbox items:
As with any non-cancelable taunt, don't forget to use eating time for vision.
With sandvich, banana, chocolate: you may consider eating instead of dealing your final damage to enemies on your deathbed. You can buy extra time for team retreat or distraction to delay enemy or can possibly survive, especially with sandvich

6. Engineer 🔨

Base stats

💼 Base roles: Support, Defense and Area Denial via buildings
➕ Base Health: 125 HP (185 HP overheal)
🥾 Base Speed: 300 Hu/s
✨ Passive abilities: Building status monitoring
ability to destroy buildings while dead

Sub-classes

Battle engie

Less building focused, more you focused.
Not necessarily restricted to Gunslinger only as melee but it helps you excel as a battle engie.
Less need to commit to a nest and babysit your buildings.

out and about patrol
occasional surprise attack, enemy not expect
Can use any wrench to mix it up, but gunslinger recommend especially for bullet jumpers

Gunslinger's minisentry easier to setup especially for bullet propulsion, +25 hp can help (125->150hp)
Bright blue skies in map while on BLU makes it harder to wrangler bullet jump (can't see laser clearly)
65+65+195=325 damage for 3 consecutive normal punches
With Lvl 3 sentry, you can sentry rocket jump, maybe bullet jump combine if overheal for big distance, careful fall damage
Can use non-wrench too
スリーパンチマン (three punch man)

Ninjaneering

Stealth and suspicion
Stealthy gameplay for engineer and the cost of your teammates having to walk. Recommended more for defense or whenever your teammates don't have to walk very far or if you have another engie taking care of the teleportation situation.

Eureka Effect
+

• Pistol: finishing damage after using your primary
  
• Short Circuit: delete projectiles, especially when going after soldiers and demomen

+

• Frontier Justice: stored crits for fast kills
  
• Widowmaker: good for constant damage to multiple picks, even better with a kritz medic
  
• Panic Attack: good damage for close ranged shots

Play it by ear. You don't necessarily have to teleport to the exit every chance you get. You can still build as you normally do (except tele) and it helps lower suspicion of enemy team so they don't go searching for a supposed secret nest or teleporter exit.
However, you might want to do it as soon as possible – depending who you're up against, the game may end very fast.

Ways to get your secret tele exit to last longer:

• Don't break stealth when too close to exit: The enemy will patrol around where the suspicious engie appeared. The closer to your base you attack, the more reasonable your positioning will be, meaning less suspicion will be aroused.
  
• Placement: Instead of the usual optimal tele placements for the team, you place them to be as less visible as possible. Away from lines of sight.
  
• Pretend: Convince the enemy that your tele doesn't exist. Place it before the round starts, away from prying enemy eyes, don't look too long in its direciton, do typical engie things.
  
• Space out your ninjaneering: Each kill will increase suspicion, making your tele more likely to be discovered.
  
• Relocate: You may come across a highly suspicious enemy and relocating your tele may become necessary. If you want to be extra stealthy, use a voice command to supress your "Teleporter goin' up." voiceline. Even further, you could collect the metal gibs if not carrying the exit to new location (slower when carrying, more likely to get caught), so the suspicious enemy won't even know where the first tele was, destroying a possible lead.

When you get tired of ninjaneering/playing too safe, upgrade then tele and build an entrance for your team to launch a concentrated flank attack. You could build a nest to defend the tele for a trickle of teammates to divide the enemy's forces until the nest and tele dies.

Engie of engie support

Rescue ranger + Pistol + Gunslinger
Rescue ranger + Short Circuit + Gunslinger
When you don't really want to commit to building a nest and would rather put more effort in boosting your other engineers. Mainly patrol around existing friendly engie nest, doing various tasks like upgrading, spychecking, objective, ocassional harassment with the ranger or pistol or defensive short circuit blasts to cover retreats and pushes. Strengthen existing nest, try not to get in the way with your building placement.

Notes

• Turtling: for defense, you don't have to sit in your nest the whole game, especially when not being actively attacked. Simply patroling in close proximity to your nest and spychecking makes you much more useful.
  
• Make the call whether to save a building or letting them die to buy you time to retreat.
  
• Save time upgrading teles: save at least one eureka loadout then back for lower cost tele – half the work to upgrade tele.

7. Medic ➕

Base stats

💼 Base role: Support via healing
➕ Base Health: 150 HP (255 HP overheal)
🥾 Base Speed: 320 Hu/s
✨ Passive abilities: 6 HP/s regen

High Value Healer
Survival is more important to you. You live longer = more heals given out to team = more ubers.
You will experience increased kill target priority because you are a high value kill.

Notes

• While healing with the medigun, your speed will match with that of the healed target if they are faster than your base speed.
  
• When injured, your passive regen is set to 3 HP/s then gradually back to 6 HP/s in 10 seconds.
  
• Your passive regen is doubled when healing an injured teammate.
  
• Dropped mediguns (via death or weapon pickup) will have their uber decay very fast, most of the time not worth depositioning yourself.

Syringe gun or Crossbow?

Syringe for better defensive capability especially against spies. Deters enemies further when you kite them while retreating into your team.
Crossbow to maximise heals and increase effective healing range.

You may have to shoot your teammates with your syringe gun to show that you aren't running the crossbow so they don't stand still expecting a healing bolt, as most medics run the crossbow.

Medic "Scout" 🎴
A worse scout that heals you

Overdose + Vaccinator
Recommended to use a fast uber-building medigun
Can get a bit overwhelming from switching weapons frequently, deciding when to uber with which resistance, whether you want to uber or run away with the extra speed or uber 1/2 times with some speed left
Vaccinator with high uberbuild rate and charge-based ubers are a great fit for this build.

At max uber, you can move at 384 Hu/s
comparisons:

• As fast as a 40-1 HP escape plan soldier
  
• 🐇 Slightly faster than an eyelander demoknight with 3 heads (381.92 Hu/s)
  
• 🐌 Slower than an eyelander demoknight with 4 heads (406.56 Hu/s)
  
• 🐌 Almost as fast as a scout (400 Hu/s)

Building uber off enemy spy 🎴☢️
You may be at 95% uber and there's only 1 teammate next to you, uncertain if they are a spy. You might be able to build the remaining uber, pop it immediately and retreat/find a non-enemyspy teammate.

8. Sniper 🎯

Base stats

💼 Base roles: Precision picks long range
➕ Base Health: 125 HP (Overheal/QuickfixOH: 185/158)
🥾 Base speed: 300 Hu/s
✨ Passive ability: None

Hitscan sniper ⛰️⚠️

Bias/lack of experience warning: Bing Soy doesn't like playing against/as this (more info in my TF2 suggestions guide)
Base loadout: [Any sniper rifle] + [Any] + [Any]
Counter Strike? In my TF2?

• Any sniper rifle (long-range instant burst damage)
  
• Area denial/deterrence
  
• Force enemies to counter you, changing their team composition
  
• Very powerful, can remain effective even far away from front lines
  
• Fast firing rate/reload, high damage potential if you can hit headshots, don't really need to look for ammo often
  
• Hitscan: no need to account for a projectile, less need to account for enemy's path, point and click the head
  
• Excels on wide open maps/spaces/huge sightlines, less places for enemy to flank you/hide
  
• Tunnel vision, don't stay zoomed in too long, be aware of surroundings
  
• Charge time and delay (see Sniper Rifle function times)

Variants

Noscoper

[Any sniper rifle] + [Any] + [Any]
Balanced, thoughtful, personal

• Remember, sniper rifles have no damage falloff - 50 damage at any distance. Even if you don't kill, you can weaken enemies to make them easier for your team to kill them.
  
• Jump to your heart's content
  
• Jarate to increase your 50 dmg to 68 dmg (2 shot a light class instead of 3 shots)

Huntsman Sniper ⛰️♿

Due to the existence of the sniper rifles' superior damage output and effectiveness, this is a handicap by comparison.
🚨OPEN YOUR MIND🚨
Contrary to what you may believe, there is no special "lucksman". It's a common misconception stemming from how forgiving the hitboxes are or seeing frag movies where rapid-fire large quantities of kills without the leadup being shown or clips against lower skill level or lack of clips showing less of chokepoint fire rather than more decision-making. Also: https://wiki.teamfortress.com/wiki/Lag_compensation
It can be surprisingly hard to keep up with the team and output damage – blindly firing into chokepoints just don't cut it.
Most of the time, you would have deliberately aimed for a target and as with any other weapon, you may get lucky/less deliberate shots. Huntsman gives balance to Sniper where the sniper rifle fails, and offers valuable counterplay
It's strange how disproportionate complaints are against huntsman vs hitscan snipers. Die enough to hitscan and you'll be begging for a hunstman instead.
(insert gameplay examples here (need to make more huntsman videos to showcase))
If anything, the "lucksman" term could be more appropriately applied to trying to hit an enemy during aim fatigue (>5 seconds of aiming).

Base loadout: Huntsman + [Any] + [Any]
Huntsman revolution

• Huntsman
  
• No instant hitscan, less staying at backlines, less one-sided interactions. Shot arc, speed, enemy anticipation, flicks, predictive shots, random shots. More balanced interactions, more counterplay for both sides. This is another dimension of Sniper gameplay at the palm of your hands.
  
• Less tunnel vision, active lifestyle, go deep in the battle where the action is, more effective close range, inverse of hitscan sniper
  
• Huntsman's damage type is technically "bullet", vaccinator medics can still prove troublesome
  
• Gamble your current life with the stun/kill taunt at opportuned moments.
  Examples: corners, demoknights, post-game humiliation, ace in the hole surprise attack, no time to reload arrow.
  Tip: You can trick the enemy by quickly flicking to the direction you actually want to stun/kill and taunt. Your world model will not line up with the direction of your actual taunt and that's the idea - to mislead.
  
• Great for players wanting to play sniper in way they consider more challenging and balanced, players who find the sniper rifle too easy/basic/overpowered and projectile enjoyers
  
• Trades safety of backlines for high risk/reward gameplay at closer quarters. More personal. Can still long range but harder (good)
  
• Razorback gives you chance to defend yourself against spies, forces spies to gun you down (or gives them opportunity to meme you down with their knife anyway), facestab prevention. Divert your focus spent on worrying about backstab into precise shot.
  Not sure why it recharges, shouldn't. Razorback takes up your secondary, be more calculated with shots, reload time without ace up your sleeve (like jarate) may lead you to an earlier grave. Makes skewer taunt safer against 1 backstab in a 30 second window. Affects spy behavior when skewering, they may gun you down/or try to butterknife you, can be good or bad.
  
• Missing is more punishing, especially in more aggressive gameplay. Compared to sniper rifle automatically reloading regardless if active, huntsman must be reloaded when active to fire again. A choice to switch to secondary/melee or dodge around to get your arrow back - your main firepower.

Variants

Classic (medieval) huntsman sniper

Huntsman + Jarate + Bushwacka
Balanced, thoughtful, personal

• Jarate + Bushwacka = jarwack/jwack, similar to pyro's (old) puff n' sting combo, 195 dmg in a bottle, can be defensive and offensive. Can use carbine instead of jarate for crikey+bushwacka full crits. Bushwacka gives 20% dmg vulnerability, try not to brandish it unless you have a death wish.
  
• If out of options and jarate is up, throw it at enemy so your team can mini-crit them, you can still be useful to team, even in death
  
• Try consecutive jarate + huntsman shot - less time for enemy to react/runaway from jarate's mini-crit damage potential

SMG Huntsman

Huntsman + [Any SMG]+ [Any]
A more bearable huntsman for the layman

• Deal heavy damage with bow then finish off enemies with SMG or vice versa (chip dmg into big damage finish); makes scout matchups more tolerable

Punishment huntsman

Huntsman + Razorback + Shahanshah
Look me in the eyes

• Missed shots more impactful, no secondary to save you/provide value for teammates to have easier time killing your killer
  
• High risk, high reward, low risk low reward nature of Shahanshah: 81 dmg when <50% hp, 49 otherwise
  
• Use razorback anyway even if no spies, situational hardcore

Temporal huntsman ♿

Huntsman + [Any] + [Any], high ping
Galaxy brain

• Terrible ping but you play anyway, anticipating movements before your enemy even knows where they're going to move
  
• The further the server, the harder it is
  
• May throw off your low ping aim if done too much

How the huntsman works:
Some shot angle examples may be misleading due to them standing completely still
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvOaUF1Sl5c
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8RjDM6-nLxc

smg can deal exactly 300 dmg (hvy hp) directly point blank

• 8a. Dealing with sniper rifle users

revise
========
Sniper rifle users – especially with competent ones – will change the dynamic of the game drastically. You mayn't notice at first, but the more you play, you'll see how much you have to change your gameplay.

I don't like the sniper rifle in it's current state. It deals too much damage too fast as a hitscan weapon. For me, It changes gameplay for the worse.

General notes

• Fear the damage: You can die in an instant. Think twice before approaching the sniper in an area with inadequate cover.
  
• Fear sightlines: especially long ones are dangerous. Be very careful, navigate your way through map going from cover to cover. Ducking under the payload cart can help temporarily but you'll then get caught by the rest of the enemy team or shot by the sniper when the cart goes downhill.
  
• Thirdperson vision given from taunting: utilize this when approaching especially scary sightlines where your main concern is dying to a sniper rather than the rest of the enemy team.
  Sidenote: don't use instantly-cancelable taunts for the purpose of combat as taunting should come with a potential cost of dying.
  
• Harass with long range projectiles, may not be effective but could be enough to distract them so you can get a push going
  
• You may not like having to pick a "counter" for the hitscan sniper, especially if you are attacking (they don't need to walk as far as you to be effective on front lines, see coping mechanisms)
  
• Hesitation will kill you, sniper can potentially headshot you every 2 seconds. Good sniper will already know where to aim. They have a plan. Do you have a plan?
  
• Consider a different approach if sniper is defending and has easy access to spawn room to replenish hp/ammo, who is wasting more time: you or the sniper?
  
• Pick a "counter" like vaccinator medic (to help team) or fists of steel heavy (makes sightlines less dangerous) or spy or whatever stealthy variation of a class (see below).

Class

---

Scout

• Flanking routes
  
• Bonk, bombk
  
• Backscatter if feeling extra stealthy
  
• Meatshots

Soldier

• Rocketjumping – more advanced techniques like pogo/wall/speedshot will help you get to them faster, making it harder to aim. Try to airstrafe unpredictably. Anything air related can be very discouraging especially if sniper is good.

Pyro

• Detonator, scorch shot, long range harassment. Sniper can strafe to dodge of put on danger shield to counter this further.
  
• Darwin's Danger Shield greatly thwarts your fire damage, but makes them more vulnerable to spies (no razorback).
  
• Flank routes.
  
• Do what you can and support your team against enemy spies and projectiles.

Demoman

• Stickyjumping, trimping past frontlines to pick sniper. If sniper sees you they may kill you mid-air, if not, fall damage, they can finish you with bodyshot/melee+splash damage from your explosive.

Heavy

• Fists of Steel so you can survive the frontlines for a few headshots, tank for team while capping/pushing cart, giving sniper ultimatum
  
• Gloves of Running Urgently to get to frontlines faster – lowers commute time (on top of respawn time), so the walk back feels less of a chore
  
• Get a medic to help you while you do objective

Engineer

• Support team, avoid sightlines
  
• Avoid putting teleporter exit in sightline. Destroy/move tele if sniper is camping it.

Medic

• Avoid sightlines so you can be alive to heal your team from non-sniper threats
  
• Vaccinator bullet resistance – keep it on at all times unless fatally threatened by another damage type. Keep at most 1 Übercharge for reserve, you expect to die from a headshot anyway, so you might as well use as much bullet resist uber as you can.

Sniper

• The better hitscan sniper usually wins.
  
• Huntsman users: don't 1v1 a hitscan sniper if you can help it. You could gamble a quick shot then not repeek that same angle, but still risky. If you have enough time to take an accurate shot while they aren't aware of you, good.
  
• Throw a jarate at them, might make them more cautious, pulling some of their attention on aim toward self-preservation from possible long-range harassment.

Spy

• The conventional counter, snipers usually focus on aiming mostly, they usually hear decloak due to being away from the loud front lines. Experienced snipers can quickly turn around and headshot you at point-blank range.
  
• Gun down if Razorback, might be troublesome if surrounded by sentry/enemy teammates. At least good for Pyros to set them alight since no Darwin's Danger Shield.
  
• Induce fear, distract them from killing your team with their powerful sniper rifle.

---

========
How to play around (long-range) hitscan 😨🎯
A necessary evil?
Hitscan is instant laser, not like projectile.
Mostly hitscan sniper, not really heavy since he's slow and not long-ranged (balanced).
May be helpful for those people more annoyed playing against this like Bing Soy (he likes the personal feeling of projectiles/melee in TF2, more complex (anticipation, travel time, jumps/surfs, arc, variable speed), they usually draw players closer in combat, makes you feel more considered, looking your enemy in the eye in glorious combat).

Coping mechanisms

• Be wary of the snipers and play whatever class you wanted to play but don't force yourself. Games, especially casual ones shouldn't be so stressful that they cause harm to you.
  
• If one of those people who go crazy with the wacky strategies, consider being shot down instantly for being reckless as part of the cost of succeeding with those "strategies".
  
• Disconnect and do something else (don't force yourself others will continue the fight): join different server, different game, draw a picture, go to sleep, talk to friend if you can
  
• Feel accomplished whenever you kill a hitscan class as you have braved the hitscan which takes much resolve.
  
• Do something productive (that doesn't require too much brainpower) while respawning: lift weights, cardio, drawing, cleaning room, organising PC files, grooming (combing hair, nails), drink water, stretch, sort clips/demos

Alternatives

• Join instaspawn server, reduce stress of walking all the way to the front lines then dying instantly with little gameplay. Less worry about being in respawn all the time, no need to play so cautiously in a way that compromises your enjoyment of game too much.
  
• Join a server like Uncletopia[uncletopia.com] with class limits – no sniper/class stacking (max class limit of 3). This mitigates the problem but 1 competent hitscan sniper can still be devastating.
  
• Disconnect from game/take a break/play a different game.

If playing as (competent/highly skilled) hitscan sniper, don't be too surprised if entire enemy team plays more cautiously, like a support class to avoid being instantly killed from a sightline. These targets are sentient.
Is this a symptom of something bigger? Journey, destination? Means, end? Existing systems and how people use them?

Additional notes:
Me taking time to learn Huntsman made sniper a least favorite to a top favorite class to play as, even being objectively worse damage-wise.

Sniper balance discussion
https://youtu.be/C7Rm5NhTm-k

9. Spy 🔪

Base stats

💼 Base roles: Picks, building disable
➕ Base Health: 125 HP (Overheal/QuickfixOH: 185/158)
🥾 Base speed: 320 Hu/s
✨ Passive ability: Can use enemy teleporters

• ⛰️ Spy
  
  • Spread fear upon your enemies, especially among medics
    
  • Use gun
    
  • Trickstabs less effective against more experienced players. Try less obvious approaches?
• ⚠️TFC Spy
  
  • No cloak allowed
    
  • Experience Team Fortress Classic Spy
• ⚠️Agent 47
  
  • No cloak allowed, Eternal Reward for undetected kills
    
  • Can only disguise from kills or copying ragdolls on the ground
    
  • Intense assassin roleplay, will you get a silent assassin rating?
• ⚠️No cloak and No disguise
  
  • Super handicap for stealth and retreat
    
  • Gun spy action may increase
• ⚠️Butterknife spy
  
  • Walk up to an enemy and stab them
    
  • May occasionally get a backstab/facestab
  Building destruction:
  
  • You may use your gun in conjunction with your sapper to kill buildings quicker before the enemy engineer has a chance to save their buildings.
    You may taunt kill buildings for more "style", but it's less practical: stun-locked in taunt animation and it takes about a second more to destroy (based on a test comparing the destruction of a LVL3 sentry from sapper+revolver to sapper+fencing).
  Other stuff:
  
  • Randomly uncloak in earshot distance in a safe spot to induce mass paranoia upon the enemy team, wasting time looking for you instead of the objective.

Speed
big earner dead ringer

Counterplay

• Don't underestimate the knife: you will get stabbed in the face, things appear differently server/client-wise, hitboxes may be misleading, and it will look like getting face-stabbed – even if you look and fire directly at them.
  https://youtu.be/i13iDhebHrI
  
  • Pyro's airblast can help you control the spy to prevent him getting in melee range. Be careful you don't airblast him to his advantage: into less-equipped support-class teammates, setting the spy up for a free drop-stab.
    
  • Higher mobility allows you to make more distance for you to shoot/escape from spy before they possibly backstab you. Mobility things: scout, powerjack pyro, blast jumping
• Misdirection is a key tool in a spy's arsenal. (add more here)
  
• Spies usually want to manipulate you into looking away from them for a backstab, whether through getting you to drop your guard since you think they aren't a spy or in active combat through tricky movement.
  
• Spies will prefer to decloak in noisy areas if they want to get closer to the action with less need to close distance. In addition to the front-line battle noises, you likely won't clearly hear them uncloak due to being focused on everything else. Try to look out for your teammates. You could also occasionally do a 360 for vision, but it may disorient your aim or give you carpal tunnel if you do it too frequently.
  
• if it looks like your teammate wants to spycheck you, reassure them by doing an attack or swing your melee weapon (spies can't do this without breaking disguise) or don't try too hard to avoid their spycheck. find good timing for this as you may be 1 shot short should an enemy approach.

Techniques

Cloaking

• Utilize battle noise and commotion to mask uncloak
  
• Damage resistance
  
• Jar/milk/gas wears of quicker

Using your fencing kill taunt

Spy Knife kill taunt: Two consecutive mini-stabs of 25 damage then a killing thrust of 500 damage. 5.3 seconds taunt duration.

• Most of the time impractical and unreliable since the first 2 ticks of non-lethal damage will alert the enemy, usually resulting in them turning around and killing you.
  
• Precise corner taunts are less forgiving compared to Sniper's Huntsman Skewer. Give it a slightly wider berth. It's even less forgiving against buildings, meaning bad news if you want to kill-taunt a corner sentry.
  
• Note that this taunt is piercing, unlike Heavy's showdown or Sniper's skewer. This means you can kill multiple enemies who happen to be condensed in front of you. This also means you can kill an enemy/enemies through a building, destroying it in the process.
  
• Shadow fencing: immediately fencing after uncloaking/dropping disguise
  
  • Initiates the kill taunt as fast as possible, with residual cloak from the fade time
    
  • Can be a fast way to destroy a dispenser and possibly unsuspecting people inside dispenser
    
  • Find an opportune moment; take note of enemy location and rotation (will they see/hear you on uncloak?)
    
  • For a quieter solution, you could instead uncloak out of enemy earshot and use a disguise to infiltrate, then dropping the disguise to immediately initiate your taunt.

Settings 🚧

wip

separate guide?
autoexec stuff
custom
you could cfg but recommended custom so isolated from game files, easier to manage

viewmodels
default settings are bad and usually take up quarter of whole screen space/zoomed in, leave default if you want

fov 90
fov_desired 90
viewmodel_fov 90
viewmodel_fov_demo 90
tf_use_min_viewmodels 1

hitsound good for auditory feedback for damage
deathsound

damage numbers, keep track of damage, less guessing, more calculated

optimize game, run better, good for low spec gamers
https://mastercomfig.com/

mods
demo stuff sep guide

Map Props

Water 🌊

• hold space when on course toward water body, especially at high velocity - it retains and you skip like skipping stone. high velocity sources examples: soldier rocket jump, spy rocket surf, pyro det/thrust jumps, demoman sticky, wrangler jumping (bullets/rockets), surviving a double donk
  
• cleans jarate and milk effects, but makes you wet, susceptible to pyro sharks (neon), slightly visible when cloaked spy (dripping effect)

Barrel 🪵

• camoflage, sneak attack
  
• low damage doesn't break it like pistol bullet or well aimed shotgun that only has one bullet hit, can hide inside, try not to knock them over
  
• stickies, loch n' load, jarate, milk, gas can also push
  
• when barrel settles down it will lock you in place, will need to tap it again to exit, but too much and it will break
  
• you can't taunt while stuck inside barrel but you can taunt before barrel settles down, its inconsistent. if you taunt and barrel freezes you, it will cancel taunt. possible way for taunt canceling but inconsistent, have to anticipate when barrel goes to non-moving state
  
• even if you pull this off, you still need to smash the barrel to free yourself if you need to move + the barrel may interfere with your flames
  
• if stuck inside barrel, you can build enough momentum from non-damaging jump sources like rocket jumper or if a teammate shoots a bullet from pistol to let you in as sticky jumper demo, can almost achieve a teleport-speed movement, practicality questionable, probably some sort of "stucklaunch"[wiki.sourceruns.org]
  
• phlog canceling is possible when barrel freezes but maybe unreliable
  
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TMqx8ZNKo80

Train 🚉

• can jump on bananabay train, accelerates your velocity when you jump off, more apparent when blast jumping with various classes (demoman may have difficulty since stickies don't stick to trains, try iron bomber)
  
• mossrock: jump on train carriage; highest point of train, let it take you toward wall. you will then be stuck in the air with this unusual angle. you cannot move and will die to the next train.

Trees / Bushes / Foilage 🌲

• camoflage, vision, surprise, infamous historic strategy, used by our ancestors and distant ape cousins to this day
  
• some trees don't like it when you stand on them and will push you off, can use this to phlog cancel
  
• some bushes can provide enough cover to obsure enemies' view of you but may also cost you some vision
  
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZ28uurRpok

Cliff / chasm ⛰️

• thrusting yourself into certain death to surprise enemy, not expecting to aim into cliffspace, can dodge potential fatal hit at cost of buying a second or two for your final shot
  
• recommended not to overuse, more as surprise/desperation move, enemy team can get wise to it
  
• scout can use multiple jumps to dodge into cliff then back to land, surviving
  
• don't give up if knocked into cliff, if you can get a shot off or use your weapon to get back to land, do it (thermal thruster, scout jumps, rocket jump if knocked back into wall)
  
• cliffspace can give you unique angles; but are they worth the respawn time and walk back?
  
• Some cliffs have certain spots

Sawblades ⚙️🧩

• most commonly found in sawmill maps
  
• provides moving cover
  
• you can stand on the little circular bit that sticks out of the sawblade, like a moving platform. with practice you can mount it quicker without dying as much. while mounted, you can jump and still land, remaining on the sawblade, but you may fall off when it reverses direction on each end when jumping.
  
• it's possible to stop a sawblade by sandwiching yourself between one of your non-teleporter buildings and the side of the sawblade that sticks out slightly

Small decorative rocks and props 🪨

• Small decorative rocks/props on the map usually don't have collision, could be a place to hide sticky trap.

Taunt stuff

halloween/full moon: be wary when you have the following weapons with a kill taunt, the halloween thriller taunt will override the kill taunt:
-pyro shotgun
-spy stock knife
-heavy stock fists
-pyro hothand

as mentioned earlier with sniper's stab taunt, you can to quick flick to your actual intended taunt direction/killzone and mislead/direct enemy as you have moved so fast that your character world model lags behind rotation-wise (they might walk in what they think is a safe spot but it's actually the killzone) - like an additional mind game thing. probably more useful when if you are both aware of each other, making a "normal" taunt less effective. like taunt killing in general, the enemy might start getting wise and look for a taunt killer. blend with "normal" gameplay, keep enemy on their toes

taunting can bait enemy to outposition themselves for what they think will be an easy pick, try to capitalize/utilize this, you might be able to escape/get a kill/get the enemy killed from a teammate taking advantage of the situation.

taunting effectively "self-stuns" you, but grants third person vision
(contrary to previously mentioned, there's objections to exploiting instantly cancellable taunts like conga, effectively having little consequence when taunting for free third-person vision and being able to instantly fire weapon)

taunt canceling
- phlog: more challenging way to phlog, utilize some of the uber with "more" crit time
https://youtu.be/cl1zR70xXrg
- engineer: taunt on building, destroy, bait enemy. situational bait.

Switch to support/offense once in a while

Especially for those gung ho/supportive mercenaries among you. Help team balance, in team game.

Why?

• Slightly balances team composition, even for a while
  
• A nice gesture
  
• Increase team survivability > increase team morale since they are dying less > increase player retention on your team
  
• To help yourself justify the dumb strategies you keep doing
  
• You can learn things by playing more supportive - positioning, thought processes, etc.

Methods:

• Try a round or even 1 life as a support class
  
• Finding support too passive? Play more aggressively. Find a way to be effective and work around your classes shortcomings.
  
• Switch to engie, upgrade that tele
  
• Play medic for a life or two
  
• Switch to power class for a life to help when losing, team may be lacking meat (full of snipers, medics, spies, etc.)
  
• If you really, really don't want to play support, then don't
  
• Provide positive/constructive encouragement/feedback if able, flicking your mouse up and down may suffice
  Still things you can do to be more supportive as (more) offensive classes-:
  
  • Let the lower hp teammate grab that health pack (triage)
    
  • Share lunchbox as heavy
    
  • Distract enemy, provide covering fire to secure your teammates' retreat/advance
    
  • Think twice before firing a projectile toward a pyro
    
  • Become a meat-shield for a dying/valuable teammate, you may die in the process but you might have saved them. At your discretion.

Gamemodes/servers

Valve's casual
- core TF2 community, filled servers more reliably
- higher cheater/bot presence, seems to be reduced recently, not sure as Bing Soy doesn't go there normally

Community servers sometimes have niche community. Find nice place for you. Try to read the room if you can.

Uncletopia (casual-like)

https://uncletopia.com/servers
- skill level leans higher than Valve casual
- basic QoL changes for a more balanced/team-based experience.[uncletopia.com] examples: no random crits, 3 max class limits.
- mostly not too serious players reside here but sometimes you might get a player who will start a votekick on you if they deem that you aren't pulling your weight - whether you are friendly, deciding to goof around for one life after tirelessly fighting or you simply aren't up to their high standards for a casual game. if you see a certain player watching you closely, they might be getting ready to votekick you. if a server has kicks enabled, this will happen.
at the very least to the unrestrained votekickers, leave a message like "hey, stop dancing and fight". do you really care that much about winning a casual game to exclude someone else from playing without any warning? (yes)
Example: (2024-04-08) after playing in the server for a bit, see someone doing the mannrobics dance, then i do dance for fun until i die then i play "normally" again but i got votekicked before that. they see someone who just joined server not helping team but they don't know i played seriously recently in other uncletopia servers and am a regular. hate to see votekicks feeling weaponized to exclude others for a slight improvement to your experience at the detriment of others, instead of being reserved for true afks, chat/mic abusers, cheaters.

Team deathmatch

- good place to work on your techniques
- less strict about objectives (often disabled), more about purely fragging people
- usually instant respawn, get back in the action without wait

Jump

- practice your mechanical skills, become better jumper
- patience is key, advised not to force yourself to stay up hours on end to complete a single jump, do this over time, like learning to ride a bike (but the bike can evolve and become harder to ride the more you want to push it's limits)
- better jumping skills can mean more extravagant market gardens

Dodgeball

- practice your pyro reflection skills, "ball"/rocket increases speed on every reflect
- be wary of carpal tunnel, as you may find yourself flicking the mouse frequently
- learn to fear projectiles less, meaning more controlled responses against them – may help you in other gamemodes

Silly/friendly servers

- place for people more focused on socializing/not-fighting
- friendly embassy
- some silly servers hosted by lazypurple
https://www.lazypurple.com/serverinfo.php

MGE (My Gaming Edge; 1v1 Deathmatch)

https://wiki.teamfortress.com/wiki/MGE_Mod
- different experience from casual TF2, 1v1 gameplay, technical skill matters more (compared to team-based gameplay)
- it's advised to bring your friends (if available) as the servers may often be empty, and if not, some don't take kindly to you joining their duels and will just leave (is there "lock" function where people can use to prevent this from happening?)

Mann vs. Machine (MvM)
- mann up: pay per game, very, very, low chance to "earn" shiny weapons, not recommended for casual fun, seems to be more powergaming + toxicity compared to boot camp due to greed and thirst for expensive items (personal experience, haven't touched mann up since)
recommended to party up with friends, also recommended to give non-friends a chance to play the game or try not kicking them before last round because you feel obligated to punish them for not playing perfectly so they don't get their drops. look at your actions. you don't need to necessarily be nice, but to just not be horrible.
a shame this gamemode gravitated this way but like many things, symptom of bigger problem. capitalism doesn't have to hurt people so others can get ahead. we should be in control of money, not the other way around.
if you really want a shiny weapon, try trading/negotiating for one at a site like https://backpack.tf/, don't get scammed. if you really want the satisfaction of "earning" your shiny weapon, party up with friends, otherwise you would need immersive mental fortitude AND exemplary MvM skills to deal with the environment there, which honestly would be better applied anywhere else
even if you didn't enjoy and will never play mann up again, you did at least support valve, so there's that.
- boot camp: more focused on killing robots/fun, no item rewards
- be careful as scout, missing a dollar might make your team angry, despite your efforts.
again, advised to play with friends, and if you do, be a positive change, be nice to non-friends because people usually try their best and it's a video game for having fun
- Better explanation of MvM toxic things:
https://youtu.be/bF11VlX5QvE

Other Ettiquite

Manners maketh mann.

• Being AFK - some servers allow this, some don't. Are you taking up a player slot more than you are using the slot? (learned this when tweaking class configs on a live populated server when probably should've opened a training map, realized too late but learned, may feel unfair that other people get away with it)
  Possible solutions: automated AFK kick, proximity-to-spawn system to detect people being effectively AFK, automated chat messages (when AFK behavior detected) that warn player about AFK rules to reduce need to manually address players who don't know but will understand once informed.
  
• Votekick - use this for kicking cheaters, communication abuse, active scammers and possibly AFK players when the server is full with people wanting to join.
  Do not use if you personally don't like a player.
  
• For server moderation - recognising the good and bad, deciding when to issue a warning instead of a ban, making your server rules more available/comprehensive, helps with people not don't know/understand unwritten rules generally understood by majority.
  
• Don't be too hard on yourself, especially if you try hard to avoid breaking rules, people slip up all the time, no-one's perfect (not an excuse to intentionally go and make mistakes, more to live less in fear of making a mistake)
  
• Try not to force yourself to play the game or with someone on a server actively causing you grief, like a cheater who usually intend on feeding off negative reactions
  
• Try your best to turn your negative experiences into civilised discussion or productive work instead of contributing to the negativity.
  Example, you may not like being unfairly vote-kicked over and over again, so instead of being corrupted/brought down, try playing a different game or spending time with your family. What's truly important in your life?
  
• Refrain from using NSFW/NSFL sprays or decals. Seek your own containment with consensual parties. Even if you don't care about traumatizing adults, do remember that kids play this game.
  Due to widespread misuse of these features, many have opted to disable these and won't be able to see your spray/decal, even if it's completely fine.
  
• Refrain from bullying (not friendly banter). If you want to be taken seriously, respected and seen as a strong person, try being helpful or hold your tongue. Can the cycle end with you?
  
• Read the room. Don't be too angry if you blatantly broke rules/get banned for saying gamer words. Shouldn't words matter?

Resources

tr_walkway[gamebanana.com], a versatile training map
Uncletopia servers[uncletopia.com], for a more balanced TF2 experience (ft. no random crits) (server settings)[uncletopia.com]
VAVLIE TF2 , pyro jumps + more
shounic, technical breakdowns
Official Team Fortress Wiki

Thanks

thanks

[Tyler Durden]

Really enjoyed the guide Bing Soy. Introduced me to a lot of cool and new strats for my favorite classes. Hope you update it soon. Cheers!

[Storange4Mike]

Hello bingsoy!

[UncleManBun]

Wowie, thanks bing soy.
Super helpful

[A_unfunnyguy]

dam how long did it take you to write all of this?

[Fartmoney45]

bro this is a fake bing soy

[quickwire]

OH MY GOD IT'S BINGSOY, THE SECOND COMING OF CHRIST IS HERE!

[Dino_Pack]

Bing Soy, you have shown me how the TF2 community isn't all bad. I've been playing for years and in 2018 started I started playing on Steam, but I stopped because everyone started being toxic and just all and all bad. You're a great guy and shoot me a friend request (that's if you want to) cause it doesn't let me (it says your friends list is full) and thanks for everything!

[Raven]

It's the man the myth the legend.

[Wonti]

He my best friend

[Faithleap]

Thanks Bing Soy! :)