Official Team Fortress 2 Game Nights (PC)

I played some really good custom maps tonight on a random server. A remake of the original 2fort as well as my favorite, a remake of the original Well. That sent me back quite a few years.

I able to play some tonight for the first time in 3-4 weeks (work, holiday, finally finishing Bioshock, etc.) . Good times, although I'm incredibly rusty. Hopefully over Christmas break I'll be able to put some quality time back into it................

Augh, I had a TERRIBLE night... Clearly I was not ready for the return of Jake.

Ah yes. The return of Jake. That was scary. I think he seriously owned me last night.
This was the first time I played SnoFort and Smooth maps so I spent a little time getting lost.
Not too long though. It seems every time I went around a new corner there was Jake with a mini-gun and a medic in tow. The next I'm seeing after that is "You will respawn in 15 seconds".
Welcome back, Jake. (I think.)

Gameraotaku wrote:

Good games tonight, except for the Patch problems and that soldier who kept blowing himself up rather than die like a man from my righteous flames. That was poor sportsmanship.

haha i do that all the time if i'm able.

jakeleg wrote:

Maybe shorten Hydro some?

I don't think Hydro rounds need shortening (in fact I personally enjoy a good stalemate), but the map should only last until one side wins. That would shorten the overall length of the map play time.

I'm not sure I like Snofort map. It's so dark. The bases are not easily recognizable (they are both wood shacks and the blue/red markings are not very visible due to darkness). Can't say I'm a big fan.

I'm still working on that "play one round as each class" achievement, so I spent a round as a sniper last night. I'm sorry if I was on your team - I'm apparently a godawful sniper. I did better as a medic.

lol! I was wondering why you kept punishing your self Chris! Hemi was handing you your butt over and over.. but i was proud you came back for more

Fun games last night but because I wanted to kill Jakeleg so much I ended up sucking because if I saw him I would concentrate all my fire on him. But I did get to one shot him in the head while he was capturing a point and being healed by two medics.. so it was all worth it

Also I think it was ranalin (or subaltern) that shot me 1/2 way across the map to my death right after I shot and killed him.. funny as hell. I was flying through the sky going this is not going to end well.. then I fell on my keys and died

Kraint also was upset at me for shovel killing him, for the longest time he would continuously attempt to hunt me down and when he finally did it he celebrated.. I could hear him scream YES!!!! over the internet.

IMAGE(http://img172.imageshack.us/img172/8770/gameraotakuislookinggoopo4.jpg)
Gameraotaku sitting down after being defeated in a long round of hydro

IMAGE(http://img180.imageshack.us/img180/5057/kraintislookinggoodfq6.jpg)
The aforementioned victory dance over my dead body.

Maybe the return of Jakeleg will will give me some relief from Tkyl searching me out and backstabbing me as much as I'm playing heavy.

To my teammates, sorry for the past few nights of my bad spy playing. I'm not that good yet, but I just wanted to take a break from my usual heavy. I'm gonna keep practicing and watching better spies. I'll get better eventually...(hopefully)

Gumbie wrote:

To my teammates, sorry for the past few nights of my bad spy playing. I'm not that good yet, but I just wanted to take a break from my usual heavy. I'm gonna keep practicing and watching better spies. I'll get better eventually...(hopefully) :)

you're doing fine. You were responsible for some caps and wins last night. Plus i saw you plow through a group of us on one map.

Gumbie wrote:

To my teammates, sorry for the past few nights of my bad spy playing. I'm not that good yet, but I just wanted to take a break from my usual heavy. I'm gonna keep practicing and watching better spies. I'll get better eventually...(hopefully) :)

You deserve more credit than you give yourself. From what I've seen of you playing, you definitely know how to play a spy.

I thought gumbie did great as a spy. He would sneak past my entire team.. then I would shotgun him in the face!

Here is a tip gumbie walk backward! When everyone is walking forward and I see one solider with full health walking back I know its you But I even thought I had a bit of ESP when guessing spys last night.

Gumbie wrote:

To my teammates, sorry for the past few nights of my bad spy playing. I'm not that good yet, but I just wanted to take a break from my usual heavy. I'm gonna keep practicing and watching better spies. I'll get better eventually...(hopefully) :)

If it makes you feel any better, you absolutely cold fooled me the other day. I started healing you, switched to syringe gun to spy-check, decided you were legit after a few shots, switched back to medigun and wasn't able to get my saw out in time when you pulled your pistol and capped my ass. Game, set, and match. I almost wept with shame, consoling myself with "well at least I didn't uber him."

Gumbie wrote:

To my teammates, sorry for the past few nights of my bad spy playing. I'm not that good yet, but I just wanted to take a break from my usual heavy. I'm gonna keep practicing and watching better spies. I'll get better eventually...(hopefully) :)

The most difficult ability I think a spy has to learn is how to manage cloak. The best way is to just experiment on how late you can run around without it and finding place to let it regenerate. It will take lots of dying but once you find some spots that are deep into the enemies base that you can decloak, you will have a lot of fun and more success.

I still suck as a spy, but one of the things I try to do consistently to manage cloak is disguise as my own team's color as I leave my base. Once I get to the other team's base, I find a secluded spot, hit 'B' to switch to the other team's color, then cloak and begin my operations. This will get you a lot closer to the enemy backlines than just running out the front door and hitting cloak when you think you'll be seen.

This is probably Spying 101, but it has helped me a bunch, especially on maps like 2 Fort where you really need the extra cloak time to get close to the intel unnoticed.

Now I need to master the art of the fluid sap/switch/backstab. That, and being less conspicuous period.

MyBrainHz wrote:

Now I need to master the art of the fluid sap/switch/backstab. That, and being less conspicuous period. :(

No, we do *NOT* need any more really good spies. Please.

Oso, if I remember right, you were healing Gumbie on the way down to the intel room on 2Fort. I was right behind you, I think disguised as a soldier, and couldn't catch you because of the speed difference. Before I could think of another way to take you out I got spychecked by a buddy pyro of yours.

Yeah, all the spies were driving me into a paranoid fit last night. I swear, the other team must have had 4 spies at one point. I'd kill one, think I was safe, and two seconds later get backstabbed and have to listen to all my engie toys get broken while I wait to respawn.

MyBrainHz wrote:

I still suck as a spy, but one of the things I try to do consistently to manage cloak is disguise as my own team's color as I leave my base. Once I get to the other team's base, I find a secluded spot, hit 'B' to switch to the other team's color, then cloak and begin my operations. This will get you a lot closer to the enemy backlines than just running out the front door and hitting cloak when you think you'll be seen.

Hit B to switch colors? I didn't know anything about that. Is there some sort of spy guide out there that explains this stuff? I tried spy a little and wasn't sure how to even place the sappers. You can't do it while cloaked, right? I think I was cloaked.

That's how bad a spy I am, I think I was cloaked.

Good games last night. It was nice to get to play again. Props to JaSeR and Rebel who medic'd my heavy on quite a few maps. We had some nice runs.

As far as the new maps, I agree snofort is really dark and sparse. I think I may drop it. Smooth is very confusing. I give the designer some credit for trying to do something different, but it suffers from too many confined corridors and small boxy areas. You need to have some larger open sections for balance. There just isn't any real flow to the map. I also heard a few grumblings about Impact. I may drop all 3 of these unless somebody gives me a really compelling reason not to. It is a bad sign when people are marking time until the map is over.

Hit B to switch colors? I didn't know anything about that. Is there some sort of spy guide out there that explains this stuff? I tried spy a little and wasn't sure how to even place the sappers. You can't do it while cloaked, right? I think I was cloaked.

Pressing B switches to the last disguise you just used. If you happen to be disguised as your own team's color, it will switch you to the enemy color.

For example, say you're BLU. Disguise as a BLU pyro by using the dash key before you select your class. Head to the enemy base and find an out of the way hiding spot. Press B and you will now be a RED pyro. Cloak and go about your nefarious business. Note that whenever you attack (with knife or pistol) you will lose your disguise. Sapping does not remove your disguise.

You can't do anything while cloaked except uncloak, and even that takes a second or so. Sadly.

There's a How to Play the Spy video on youtube which is a really good primer, but spectating some of our local spies (Distantsound and Tkyl in particular) makes for a good crash course.

The less CTF, the better, IMHO. No objections here.

Nyles wrote:
MyBrainHz wrote:

I still suck as a spy, but one of the things I try to do consistently to manage cloak is disguise as my own team's color as I leave my base. Once I get to the other team's base, I find a secluded spot, hit 'B' to switch to the other team's color, then cloak and begin my operations. This will get you a lot closer to the enemy backlines than just running out the front door and hitting cloak when you think you'll be seen.

Hit B to switch colors? I didn't know anything about that. Is there some sort of spy guide out there that explains this stuff? I tried spy a little and wasn't sure how to even place the sappers. You can't do it while cloaked, right? I think I was cloaked.

That's how bad a spy I am, I think I was cloaked.

'B' is the default hotkey for previous disguise. As for quickly sapping and stabbing, I probably have a weird setup but mousewheel_up = revlover, mousewheel_down = knive, 'Q' = sapper, 'E' = costume list, 'X' = previous costume.

MyBrainHz wrote:

... Tkylin particular) ...

Tkyl and Ranalin became one, and that would be scary, a spy pyro.

A spyro, as it were. Ninja edit!

MyBrainHz wrote:
Hit B to switch colors? I didn't know anything about that. Is there some sort of spy guide out there that explains this stuff? I tried spy a little and wasn't sure how to even place the sappers. You can't do it while cloaked, right? I think I was cloaked.

Pressing B switches to the last disguise you just used. If you happen to be disguised as your own team's color, it will switch you to the enemy color.

For example, say you're BLU. Disguise as a BLU pyro by using the dash key before you select your class. Head to the enemy base and find an out of the way hiding spot. Press B and you will now be a RED pyro. Cloak and go about your nefarious business. Note that whenever you attack (with knife or pistol) you will lose your disguise. Sapping does not remove your disguise.

You can't do anything while cloaked except uncloak, and even that takes a second or so. Sadly.

There's a How to Play the Spy video on youtube which is a really good primer, but spectating some of our local spies (Distantsound and Tkyl in particular) makes for a good crash course.

Umm, I'm kind of ashamed to ask this question....

You can disguise as your own team color?

Yup. Dash (-) key on the costume select menu.

Great, I've indirectly made Tkyl an even better spy. Apologies to everyone on the server, especially medics.

MyBrainHz wrote:

Yup. Dash (-) key on the costume select menu.

Great, I've indirectly made Tkyl an even better spy. Apologies to everyone on the server, especially medics. :)

Well, I'm not sure how much I'd use it. It might be usefull to run up to the enemy lines before cloaking to get behind their lines, to keep them from knowing a spy is about. But you shouldn't even let them see you cloak, which kind of defeats the whole purpose. Besides, if they do see me, I change disguises so they look for the wrong person.

MyBrainHz wrote:

Yup. Dash (-) key on the costume select menu.

Great, I've indirectly made Tkyl an even better spy. Apologies to everyone on the server, especially medics. :)

you made 2 better spies, I didn't know it either. I feel stupid heh