Next Time Try Killing One of Them
Reliable Excavation Demolition, 2nd Level
Desk of Scouting Officer for Demolition
June 16, 1968
8:00 AM
Evaluation Meeting Requested
“Come in, have a seat”. He had never seen her face, see was either a nameless voice, shouting commands out on the battlefield, or an unspeakable shadow in the dark gloomy room that she occupied. “As you know, we have always approved of, well, different methods. But, our organization doesn’t exactly… approve of some of the changes to your inventory.”
“Is this about the bat?” There was a slight pause as she took a drag from her cigarette. “Yes, yes it is. But not just the bat.” “Ah jeez, I god damn knew it! It’s not my fault I want to fracture peoples skulls!” “I have the administrator from BLU on hold, right now. You know the rocket above the Dustbowl territory? Which you lost I may remind you.” “Yeah.” “Well, she says if we don’t do something about your inventory, she’ll launch it at the nearest area.”
“You do know the agreements we made when we started this whole territory swap around mini-war thing, we were to never disadvantage one or the other corporation. And epically, not remove control from the, hem, excuse me, contestants of these battles.” He cringed at those words, knowing the consequences that could come. He seemed to remember those who had cheated in the past on there Weapon Selection.
“Here, I had the Engineer, god knows his name anymore, draw up some diagrams for a new design.”
Knucklehead Killer
“I believe the changes our hard-hatted friend made are that he removed the knock back from the weapon, but, the weapon will crit when you are in the air, above your enemy, rewarding the offensive scout who takes risks and is able to dodge his enemies and attacks well, instead of allowing him to avoid confrontation, like our large Russian friend would say, like a little baby coward.”
Bonk! Energy Drink; Manly Man Edition*
“I’ve noticed that this is the actually underpowered weapon in your new inventory, but it’s still an actually decent idea. It only seems to work well when you actually coordinate with a teammate, which you rarely do. We’ve had the Medic and Engineer work together to perfect the formula for the drink. They’ve uped the dosage of radiation, allowing for an increase time, added a tracker to the drink which will show up on your teammates HUDs, allowing them to find you and help you take down a sentry. And finally, they’ve reduced the knock back off sentry gun fire when you are shot at by them.”
* Bonk! Energy Drink; Manly Man Edition not pictured due to test subjects experiencing radness overload. In it’s place is the First Blood achievement. Because it’s almost as cool.
The Bambino
“This weapon is more straightforward approach to your Baseball Bat. When you hit someone with the baseball, you get crits against them when using the bat for around 10 seconds. It still gives you an advantage, but not one that assures you a one on one victory, and not one that assures your team absolute protection against ubercharges.”
“Is that it m’am?”
“Yes, that is all. Just one more thing.”
“Yes m’am?”
“Do not fail me again.”
Stumble it!
Alec responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 8:05 am #
You know, someone posted a challenge on the Steam TF2 forums, asking someone to point out where, exactly, Valve said that they’d never take control away from people in Team Fortress 2.
Nobody’s met the challenge. The closest thing that was found was in a commentary about one of the Half-Life 2 episodes.
GeneralGoose responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 8:06 am #
Pretty good ideas there.
Dracula Guy responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 8:08 am #
@Alec: It’s still not a good gameplay design to take control away, that doesn’t excuse that it’s genuinely not a good idea.
kanodin responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 8:16 am #
This is a classic example of complaining going too far in proposed changes. Now you plans are a little vague but I will try to dissect why they go too far.
1 New Scattergun: no knockback of course also means you lose the 3rd jump the FaN gives, meaning you have little airtime which makes this seem less useful already. Now does it still have only 2 shots, or 6? I dunno this is what I mean by vague. Further does your new bat still take away the double jump, if so do ya realize how useless that would make this gun? Even ignoring all that you never really say why the FaN needs to be changed into this piece of junk, just take for granted that it does.
2 SuperBonk: Have ya actually used the bonk much? I have and I’ve also had it used against my sentries, and it’s long enough to take em out with ease. This is assuming you have your team working with you of course, but really if they don’t figure out to follow you in, a little display showing where you go isn’t gonna help them, try talking to them beforehand letting them know your plan next time.
3 CritBat: Doesn’t seem worth a lost double jump, or whatever you plan it’s drawback to be, as you have to hit them from a distance then run right up and hit them with the bat to have any effect.
So while Valve is by no means perfect, it does think about and playtest these updates, and some replacements you come up with off the cuff will almost never be fully balanced and often unneeded.
Mickyan responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 8:26 am #
Not only the weapons you suggested are horrible, but i find quite hypocritic trying to disguise a rant with all the story bullshit.
may i make a suggestion?
GO PLAY THE GAME AND STOP WHINING
pigeonreaper responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 8:38 am #
I liked the story more than the actual ideas if I’m honest.
Neuromante responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 9:01 am #
Only liked the scatter replacement idea and even with it I would like to see it tested before anything: As long as it is hard to aim in air, it could be devastating in decent hands.
But hell, anything it’s better that being air-blasted by a scout.
The bonk it’s nice “as is”: A “weapon” wich makes you have some luck and coordinate with other players, and the bat it’s like the K.G.B.’s. I think it would be best to tweak the way the stun effect works.
Neuromante responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 9:04 am #
Double post, just got the idea about the sandman:
Decrease the stun time if you are alone -so the scout must use it as a “hit-and-run-away” weapon, not as “hit-and-kill-you” weapon-, and increase it when you have teammates near -so your teammates must defend you.
Metal_Link responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 9:23 am #
The first image is nice.
Himmelstoss responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 9:42 am #
Sandman idea is nice.
Doc ock rokc responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 10:03 am #
…Sigh…
Why cant anyone just leave the sandman alone.
The scout rushes on the servers i play on are almost gone (3 scouts at most!) 2 of them usualy dont use the sandman because they love bonk with full movement and the new triplejump!
but because of all the overwelming rants such as this we will lose weapons that where fine for something that puts the scout back into underpowered
Sinister Minister responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 10:49 am #
Sigh…I thought this was going to be a fun little story, but then I find it’s a rant about the Sandman and the Scout’s unlockables disguised as a story.
There goes the good streak of non-rants ubercharged was starting to have…
St. Vincent responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 12:54 pm #
nice post, well imagined character interactions, great opening image… but would have been much better had someone, you know, proofread the article.
CaptainPepsi responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 1:27 pm #
The sandman is over powered, I dont see how any intelligent person can say otherwise. TF2 has always had alot of rock paper sissors in it, for instance say you meet up with a soldier and your an engineer. 95% you are going to die, but with the sandman it gives the scout the ability to easily beat any class other then engineer. Now tell me, how is that not OP?
I think his shotgun idea is great, i have over 80 hours as scout and i would definately use it. If you have decent aiming ability you could use the shotgun unlock to great effectiveness
CaptainPepsi responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 1:32 pm #
Sorry for double post but got bat idea
The bat should knock back all slow moving projectiles, and also knock enemys into the air, the knock back into the air would be strong enough to let the scout switch to his scattergun and get off a shot or to before the enemy landed. You also shouldnt lose double jump just make the bat swing 75% slower. Then it adds more surviabilty to the scout but takes away most of his melee damage(The bat is actually quite good if you know when to use it, for those of you that think its only good for fun)
Crazy Dutch Bastard responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 2:41 pm #
Come on people! How can you say the sandman is overpowered? Any decent player can A: dodge the ball or B: kill the scout before he finishes beating it. As for the FaN: easy to kill any scout using one. Just keep following him! Dodge 2 shots; hell! Dodge one or even none! Unless you are a scout or up against a very good scout, that won’t be fatal. He has to reload and you can have sum sum of his bum bum!
Oh and CaptainPepsi: maybe, just maybe the engineer loses because he’s not SUPPOSED to be near a soldier. He’s supposed to build stuff, it’s a support class!
These silly rants are starting to piss me off. People complaining the Bonk! is OP or underpowered: baah. If you feel it’s underpowered either don’t use it or learn how to use it effectively. If you for some insane reason think of it as overpowered: the scout can’t bloody shoot! Ignore him for 4 seconds and get close to him in the last 2. Then you can take it easy and talk him to death for all I care. That guy ain’t moving anywhere (fast). What Dracula Guy has forgotten is that the pyro didn’t have any blowback at first either. Guess what: we’ve managed just fine with him since the update. Just suck it up.
Acefighter responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 4:05 pm #
Terrible. The sandman’s a bit annoying, yeah, but really, can’t somebody get a quality standard here? Also: Trying to reel someone in with a decent-looking fanfic and spending the whole thing whining is probably punishable by law, and if it isn’t, it should be. Does madlep even read these things anymore?
Kollega responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 4:43 pm #
To everyone wo complains about rants: one of the MAIN Ubercharged purposes is rants,it’s simply not madlep’s rants anymore. Now,back on topic.
For me,Force-A-Nature is fine,but that shotgun idea is neat too.
Bonk! is a bit underpowered. How about 80-90% invulnerability,speed increase,sentry targeting problems (attempts to turn,but no lock-on when Scout is jumping around randomly),damage from fire without afterburn (you’re not supposed to be near Pyros anyway) ,and no invulnerability when standing perfectly still. It would be a lot more complex,but better than simply “uber-in-a-can”.
Sandman is overpowered. Yes,it is. Scout is not supposed to kill ready-to-fire Heavies. Period. And should baseball to the face stop something unstoppable by definition? Short answer,NO. Long
answer,NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO.
Problem is that i can’t think of,or find a suggestion for decent alternative. This one isn’t seems too good either.
Scout’s effectiveness is killed anyway,mainly on Dustbowl and Goldrush,due to their linearity,shitload of chokepoints and turtling on both sides (on offense,it’s when you wait for Ubercharge to attack second point,most likely in Engi’s front line base),and because it’s FREAKING MOST PLAYED MAPS! Okay,there’s also 2Fort,but i hate it too.
Overall,this article is true. Even Announcer plays by the rules,and Sandman is overpovered just enough to cause frustraton for other players,breaking main rule of TF2 – everyone has to have fun when playing it.
P.S. Table picture is good,but weapons illustrations look awful. I think simple text would be enough.
APARTHEID responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 5:45 pm #
To be fair, there’s honestly little reason for a Scout worth his salt to use the Force-a-Nature; why sacrifice an extra four shots with that beefy extra damage for a bit of knockback and half of a jump? It has its uses, but from everyone I’ve spoken to, it’s more or less a diversion from the solid stock that is the Scattergun.
BONK! is great. No ifs, ands, or buts about it. You lose your trusty Pistol for a tried-and-true Uber-alternate on a twenty second cycle, but suddenly, you’re not waiting for a Medic to take out those pesky Sentry nests! ( And frankly, all of you bonking bonkers can pester me less for the healing, for all I care! )
Now, the Sandman is a pain in the neck either way you look at it. On the one hand, you gain the ability to knock your opponent down and out for just long enough for you and your friends to have a frenzied fit over your unfortunate lot, but in doing so, you must make do without your signature double-jump.
Is losing your mobility worth the ability to steal the mobility of others? I’m not quite so sure yet, but I am one to doubt that the vanguards of competitive play will rescind their rapport concerning this infamous Sandlot.
All in all, I’m not exactly excited with the Scout unlocks, having had time with toy around with them. If anything, BONK! will live on, while the remaining two will have to be tweaked in order to see further and farther-reaching use.
Tim responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 6:04 pm #
How disappointing. I though this would be nice story to read, but this was actually a spy face stabbing me. Oh well. Probably something better will come.
Teridax responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 6:40 pm #
Oh goodness, another “Scout Weapons Sux” rant. How could you, Dracula Guy? we played together, remember?
Anyway onto the weapons:
- shotgun: This will simply lead to Scouts spamming double-jump for continuous crits throughout the whole map. Not cool.
-MegaBonk!: The present Bonk! is already an unlimited personal mini-Ubercharge. I doubt it needs buffing. If it does happen to be UP, then maybe it could make the Scout go faster as well. You don’t need a flashy silhouette on your HUD (which Valve want as uncluttered as possible) to take out a Sentry.
Bambino: Excuse me? the word OP fits firmly in this category. Instead of hitting the ball, running up to the stunned enemy and then FANing their ass to kingdom come (which is pretty much all right for me), you hit the ball, run up to the enemy and critspam them to death, even on those 450 health Heavies which you couldn’t kill with the Sandman anyway. It simply ensures instant death, rather than suggest it. and stunning those Uberspams on Dustbowl (you know , when there are about 2 or 3 at a time?) has never been so fun.
soylent robot responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 8:10 pm #
i dont think sandman is overpowered. ive been practising with it. see, when i use it and stun a guy, say heavy, you know what happens? any other team members nearby take me out when im closing in to kill the guy ive stunned. the sandman gives you a hugely significant advantage 1 on 1, but only 1 on 1. on any other time the medic and whoever else nearby is going to murder you.
the way i see it, the sandman scout is best used for guarding the flank; running about at high speed to cover the less traveled areas and stopping any spies, pyros or whoevers trying to sneak around the back of your team. the high speed of the scout allows him to cover a large area, and the sandman gives him a (admittedly rather big) chance to not get shot/stabbed/burnt to death.
soylent robot responded on 09 Mar 2009 at 8:14 pm #
oh yeah, your suggestions make it way too easy to get crits. these are supposed to be rewards for skilled players and lucky killing sprees, not a simple double jump or ball to the head
Sinister Minister responded on 10 Mar 2009 at 12:32 am #
@Kollega: Uh, yeah, sure, rants can be fun from time to time, but have you SEEN ubercharged nowadays? It’s rant after rant after RANT. It gets annoying to the point where we question the editors and wonder how many people are such bad sports that they must rant about stuff repeatedly. Thankfully we’ve had a short blitz of actually GOOD articles, but this put that to a halt.
Secondly, no, Sandman is not overpowered. If you’re getting hit with balls repeatedly, LEARN TO DODGE. Jeez, I thought this was a standard of all FPS’s, dodging. You act like there’s a strict set of rules that everybody is supposed to be following. Just because TF2 has a rock-paper-scissors system doesn’t mean certain situations won’t happen whatsoever. Scouts can kill ready-to-fire Heavies. Scouts can even kill Pyros if they’re any good. This main rule you mention is a load of bull anyway, there’s bound to be someone not having fun. Good job ripping off Yahtzee, by the way.
Graven_Image responded on 10 Mar 2009 at 12:59 am #
I thought this was a story.
I was wrong. I feel so betrayed.
*sniff*
Mr. Noobinator responded on 10 Mar 2009 at 1:28 am #
I scream IMBA at the Knucklehead Killer!
i think Valve is trying to turn the scout into an absurd makeshift of CHUCK NORRIS
Dark Master responded on 10 Mar 2009 at 1:55 am #
“Ahahahahaha! Cry some more!”
*Bonk*
This is the problem with the sandman, getting stunned as a character that cannot dodge anything! The Heavy was suppose to be one of the anti-scout classes, but now the scout has the perfect counter to him. Heavy is my least played class, but I don’t think he should be obsolete. Take a look at the recent NerfNow comic, it somes up the problem very well.
I say, have the stun time scale to the speed of the victim, Heavies and Soldiers have much shorter stun times then Pyros and Medics. Also, a reved Heavy can’t be stunned at all except at the maximum distance, and even then he is only stunned for 1 second. Honestly, his skull is thick enough to shrug off several baseball blows.
The final thing I’d say is that Ubers should only be stunned for half the normal time, reved Heavies are comletly immune, and short range hits never do anything.
Long range: 2fort battlements
Mid Range: Distance from spawn in 2fort to opposite wall
Short Range: Flamethrower length
mew4ever23 responded on 10 Mar 2009 at 4:04 am #
Yeah, knock off the uber-stopping effect of the sandman. The only counter for an uber should be stalling until those 10 seconds of invincibility wear off.
Side note: Whoever I was playing with last night that called me a whore after saving a bonk’d team mate from from the Scout’s taunt kill: QQ mate, players have every right to kill someone taunting.
Saurous responded on 10 Mar 2009 at 8:32 am #
Well, we all know that the new weapons aren’t going to be replaced or removed, so we might as well change up how the unlockables work.
With the Sandman, how about the stun time is scaled to a person’s HEALTH, rather than distance that the ball flies (wouldn’t it actually cause more pain if you were hit by a ball at point blank rather than being hit by one from twenty yards away?). So, a full health heavy would be stunned for maybe a split second, while a full health sniper would be stunned for much longer. However, if the sniper is still at full health and the heavy has been brought down to 100 health, then the heavy would be stunned for a longer time. So, this would mean that the scout would have to actually cause some damage to the people he wants to stun if he wants to actually have any effect.
Corodan responded on 10 Mar 2009 at 12:19 pm #
This rant really ticked me off.
Play in the Scout’s shoes for a bit, and you’ll get what I mean.
Kollega responded on 10 Mar 2009 at 3:48 pm #
@Sinister Minister: i wasn’t “ripping off” Yahtzee,i was quoting him,since it was rather appropriate. And by the way,Scouts CAN kill spun-up Heavies. Problem is,it’s not supposed to happen on a daily basis, while Sandman allows Scouts to kill spun-up Heavies with relative ease.
@Dark Master & Saurous: good ideas! Stun time related to health seems to be optimal – this way Medics can help their team in yet another way (overheal FTW) And if there’s big need to keep uber-stun achievement,then it could be minimal effect on ubers (i.e. messing with the aim – no penalty for the Medic whatsoever).
Pin0 responded on 10 Mar 2009 at 9:28 pm #
good job making up crappy unlocks
JF responded on 10 Mar 2009 at 10:01 pm #
Bambino is a lot more balanced than this Sandman bs.
Killa-Ewok responded on 11 Mar 2009 at 3:30 am #
The only problem with the Scout’s new shit is Sandman; it pretty much can make a meeting with a Scout YOU’RE FUCKING DEAD (if you’re alone, that is. Or surrounded by a bunch of asshats.) How can this be solved?
“Don’t be alone” fuck you.
“Dodge it” you don’t notice the Scout, and suddenly, BONK. The instakill with stealth should be the Spy’s finesse.
“Lrn2play” no.
Saurous responded on 11 Mar 2009 at 6:42 am #
@ Kollega
Yeah, I don’t really understand why a full-health heavy can take a few rifle bullets to the head without pause, but getting hit from a foot away by some punk with a baseball stuns the poor Russian for several seconds.
APARTHEID responded on 11 Mar 2009 at 9:26 am #
@ Corodan and Sinister Minister
I am not aware of the servers you both play on, but on the ones I frequent, I have noticed a startling rise of a certain condition due to the Sandman.
It is called Genovese syndrome, and it is occuring at an increasing rate.
Within a crowd, one can be singled out by an unlucky ball, only to be dispatched by a speedy Scout … without so as much as a glance from your teammates.
Alex responded on 22 Apr 2009 at 6:41 am #
Frankly, I prefer these ideas (and of course I like the story too!) to the current.
@Mickyan – Hmmmmmmmmmmmm.
Combyne responded on 01 May 2009 at 2:46 pm #
(Yet another) sigh…
Valve tried several Scattergun replacements, and the FaN had the best playtesting. Think about it. Six rounds of crits just for jumping. This turns a successful Soldier juggle into a terrible experience, which encourages the Soldier to never do it again. Bad idea when he gets auto-balanced to your team. Bad idea for all Soldiers, skilled and new.
The Bonk! requires practice to use, and can be put at the same level as the pistol: weak at first sight, but strong in competent hands. I can’t use the energy drink. So? I just use the pistol. But I’ve utilized the Bonk! very successfully around my second time using it, and I’m sure I would’ve gotten better if I didn’t prefer the pistol by pure opinion, not power.
Finally, most (if not all) of this “Sandman is overpowered” bullshit is coming from poor suckers who got stunned and didn’t like it. Nobody likes being stunned, granted. Doesn’t mean the damn weapon is overpowered. Trust me, you’ll miss double-jumping. And the FaN isn’t the best double-jump substitute.