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Probably the first thing you think of when you hear “The War Update” is a legion of flailing Highlanders touring around for your head. Many uprisings popped up with angry plebeians proclaiming that the Demoman should be demolishing things rather than cutting up his fellow man. The truth is that the Demoman was already just fine at demolishing, just like the Soldier was doing his job properly. More power for the demolishing demoman would’ve led to mass engineers on strike, and more ammo for the homely trap-setter would’ve been too boring. The solution was something entirely unheard of; turning the class into something entirely unrelated to its premise. Valve could’ve elected either the Soldier or the Demoman as the embodiment of this new tenth class, and I suspect they went with the Demoman because claymores.

However, just like with the Razorback, traditionally thinking (yes, thinking) demomen have been given a new toy to play with: the Scottish Resistance. Although the Resistance doesn’t contain catastrophic amounts of boring like the Razorback, it’s still not as potent as it could be. The main problem is that Resistin’ Demos just end up feeling less efficient than if they were using the regular Sticky Launcher and paying taxes like good citizens. That’s why I’m taking the time to describe, in detail, six things the Scottish Resistance is better at than the Winbomb Launcher.

Trap-Spotting

“Stop sitting around and do something!” – Berrito Mussolini

This is the capital (and most boring) purpose the Resistance has been advertised for. You put bombs around multiple doorways, pick a corner and wait. Wait until an unfortunate sod comes in, at which point you twitch in his direction and detonate all over him. More controlled twitchers (likely ex-CSS players) will rig a door on both sides, always keeping one set of stickies at hand in case a second poofter shows up. The big dilemma here is that you can’t place yourself too inclined with the doorway, or selective detonation becomes impossible (the crosshair isn’t adjusted to the cone of detonation); stand too much in front and your prey will see you before coming through. You could make use of this, though. Trick the enemy into taking an alternate route that has also been rigged, then feel bad as he denotes your trickery as ’spam’.

One thing I like to do to mess with people is to set up a trap, then throw a bunch of stickies at the enemy. Ever since the game’s initial release in 2007, players have been taught that one detonated sticky means a completely defenseless demoman. Sure, the Resistance stickies are visually distinct, but no sod is going to suspect you of planning ahead of time until it’s too late.

Another fun anecdote: on our UK-based server, Laharl concealed all fourteen stickies behind the intelligence in ctf_sawmill. I thought he was doin’ it wrong until I saw him blow up the medic+targelander combo that was running amok.

Carpet Weaving

“A fancy carpet for me to shit on.” – Diogenes

I believe this is where the true potential of the weapon lies. Dot a corridor with any number of stickies between eight and fourteen, and the enemy isn’t going to advance. Your entire creation won’t be ruined anymore by a single scout’s (no longer as spectacular) acrobatics, as you can choose to devote only part of your stickies to his combustion. After putting your carpet in place, you can proceed to spam the enemy team like you usually would. So you see, you’ll have not one, not two, but two and a half primary weapons. You’re like a bagpiper with three hands!

Just make sure you NEVER stand on your carpet. While it should sound awesome to fend off attackers from atop your own handiwork, Valve implemented a ‘buff’ to detonate stickies directly under you, supposedly for sticky jumping. Why do that when you have your own base to rig? To make matters worse, the detonation range is shorter than the distance one would use for horizontal jumping. Initially, the stickies’ whole prime time was ignored for point blank stickies. This led to:

Sticky-Punching

“A scout in your face is better than a spy in your back.” – Oscar Wilde

The non-existent prime time allowed you to detonate stickies before they were even properly fired, turning the Resistance into some manner of twisted, self-mutilating Scattergun. The Scouts, Pyros and Spies would either burst in tears due to nostalgia or think nothing is off because they’re used to being exploded by things they can’t see. It was a blast punishing those cocky ne’er-do-wells for their hubris, even if it had me blow up too in the process. Particularly devestating is an ubered ’sploder; the enemy would think nothing dangerous of a Demoman running idly into a bunch of enemies, allowing me to project eight point blank blasts into their face. It was like being a suicide bomber who can’t die. The kritzkrieg, however, is an entirely different story.

One other quirk of sticky-punching was sticky-punch-jumping. Aiming downward while jumping projected you perfectly forward (not useful on Orange X) with the power of three stickies and the damage of only two. Trying to aim your jumps apart from this method is More often than not, you’ll end up ramming yourself into the ground, dying from fall damage. So it really was nothing like this.

Alas, the prime time has been re-added in a recent patch, making sticky jumping with the Resistance even more clunky. Complete removal of the tweak will likely make the following tactic more viable:

Suicide Bombing

“I invade your country in the name of liberty!” – George W. Bush

Here’s what you do. Go to an enemy control point and get your stickies all over it.  As you’re capping, the enemy will likely send flimsy scouts and pyros your way, followed by seasoned but slower soldiers and heavies. Before, all you could do was try and dispatch the scout with scrumpy or blow up the both of you in the name of honour and scout-killing. With the Resistance, you can ensure his destruction while you continue towards capture. Especially effective on A/D maps; the stickies’ longer prime time won’t matter because by the time the enemy gets to you, their point will have been impurified. You can also try confounding attackers on the final point of cp_badlands (you know, when you jump up and get stuck somewhere in the silo).

Use this tactic and you’re almost certain to capture the final point. Well, if Valve changes the weapon. Until then, the Resistance is still most efficient at…

Spawncamping

“The classes must be evened out at regular intervals.” – Leon Trotski

Okay, you may not want to hear it and you probably already know, but on unmoderated servers, the Scottish Resistance can effectively lock down a team. The main drawback of spawncamping with the regular Sticky Launcher is that your entire collection of stickies is wasted with each smelly unfortunate killed. With the resistance, you can add layers of spam in front of the spawn door, or if that’s not subtle enough, try rigging all four sides of the door! You’ll have plenty of time to patch up after each detonation. Like with Trap-Spotting, many fools will think the coast is clear when the first of your victims blows up.

In case you don’t like 32-man instant respawn 2fort/cp_orange_william, you can try doing this at the BLU exits in Gravelpit. Not even UC2’s admins will slay you (I think).

Distinguished Destruction

(hain)

“A Targelander is to a Resistance user what a Hoplite is to a Belgian falling out of a tree.” – Gaius Julius Ceasar

Okay, I admit it. The Resistance feels like a nerfed sticky launcher. But because of that, it’s so much more immersing and fun! Plus, the kill icon is stylish, and says “I have just outwitted you in a way not typical of your preconceptions of a demoman!” Eventually I switched back to the Sticky Launcher because the point blank detonations were annoying me, and when I did, it made the Demoman seem such a boring class. Even though I could do this again, the gratification was lost. This happens when you try doing things the easy way, rather than the sexy way.

Remember when the weapon was first revealed? The CQC kit had stepped on many a demoman’s toes. Now a particularly awesome weapon was revealed, and already the Poor and Irish couldn’t bear with the thought of having to deal with fourteen stickies. When the update hit us, the Targelanders rose to power en masse and the Resistance was dismissed as awkward and disappointing just because it can’t be spammed with as easily. In my days of Resisting, I made many cretins call me a ’spammer’ regardless. I used to entrench myself in the enemy’s vents on ctf_turbine and blow up a team’s worth of players, much to the amusement of my vent-mates. For this alone do I find it worthwhile to use the Scottish Resistance.