I don't watch highlander much, but neither demo nor heavy can output instant burst damage. A scout that went for the heavy first could probably kill him before the demo could save him, unless he got two direct pipes.

shit format

Instead of trying to improve class weaknesses by altering playstyles, in competitive, players tend to use each other's strengths to cover weaknesses since teamwork is readily available. So they naturally play roles that they are very good at. Because there are so many players in HL, most roles are covered by a player already, making some playstyles redundant.

Not that you won't get the oddly-successful play or two out of a strange playstyle, but people tend to prefer reliability.

On an off-topic note, the -frag brigade should consider leaving people who ask honest questions alone.

Heavy is pretty useless without 450, Demo is pretty weak without a buff and protection. Trying to clump a pocket soldier in with those 2 will just result in 4 people eating the same spam.

I think the dm of plat teams has to improve before we will see large shifts in how people play.

Wasn't -ts-'s metagame last season 'uber in ruwin and wipe enemy team'? It worked damn well.

I say the better the scouts get the more the metagame will evolve.

Well like, scout and heavy can be a fairly solid flank. The distraction of the heavy's high health and damage with a fluttering scout seems like it'd be a pain to combat. This leaves a spot for a solid pocket solly to hang out with the demo near the med. It just seems like there are a lot of ways to open up the combinations of classes in the format.

The reason the meta is what it is in comp right now is because it's what works the best consistently. The only real reason the meta changes or evolves is to adapt to the current meta and sort of try to come up with ways to counter it.

Except a pocket soldier will lose every fight against a pocket heavy. Also, having only 4 rockets against 9 players means a lot of reloading which heavies never have to do. Flank heavies would be bad because a heavy without a buff is a dead heavy.

I think I explained this in bl4nk's chat one evening.

When you include one of every class their roles become more distinct and vital. Heavy is the only true pocket available that can defend against so many opponents aside from the fact he's useless without 450. Since the heavy locks that role, soldier is left to roam as he simply lacks the ammo to be an effective pocket. The 3rd option is demoman pocket, but a demoman doesn't always need a buff to be effective and is best allowed to leave the combo if necessary in addition to being poor defense against scouts and pyros. The support classes (and pyro) are all totally locked in their roles because they really can't do anything else. Occasionally roaming pyro pays off, but its a very specific circumstance that can't always be relied on. There isn't room to shift your strategy to play more off your scout or spy because they're just too weak to be reliable.

Highlander relies so much on checks and balances within the classes that its impossible to play successfully without playing around your heavy, demoman, and engineer (on defense). Part of what makes 6s such a fun format is the limits imposed allow teams to play around any combat class they choose or even a single player (other than medic) and its hard to imagine that happening with such a rigid structure.

Roaming pyro isn't bad in maps that have many 1v1 situations. Huey Lewis roams on Steel half the time and blunderful's Satan is a full time roaming pyro

despite the fact that most pubbers have no clue what they're doing I think in 5 years everyone's worked out how the classes are meant to be played in this game, and the playstyles don't honestly deviate that much when transferred to HL

The most popular and successful strategy is:

Medic heals Demo and Heavy. Focuses heals based on what is needed (mid range or close range respectively).

Pyro hangs out with demo and heavy to defend against spys, spam, and ubers.

Scout, Soldier, and Engineer play flank. If there is no flank to play (koth, some pl) soldier and scout become pick and cleanup classes.

Sniper pretty much roams and does his own thing. May support with jarate to start a push or use the combo as protection to snipe.

Spy goes for picks 24/7. A less common but viable style is what Evan did last season on bpm. Running around with the DR and spycicle and revolvering people to death. This in conjunction with a bombing soldier or scout running in makes for some very easy cleanup of anyone who gets singled out.

And it was destructive from what I noticed. He could have ran Ambassador and been more effective. But it's irrelevant to the topic. I'm sure the meta COULD use some rare turn about in some rare situations, and finding it is going to be very difficult and uncommon. I'm simply curious if any team has experimented with unique tactics and had success.

Ok so I've read this, and several things

-Heavy as a roamer wouldn't work. Why? Because the heavy HAS to play defensively without med heals, the heavy isn't a pick class and it's very difficult for the heavy to be a pick class. While the solly can.

-Demo as a roamer wouldn't work. Why? Because they can't do close range damage consistently, and have a large difficulty defending themselves.

Thus the Demo and Heavy are really well locked into being pocket combo classes 99% of the time.

Now the Highlander Meta can easily change it with most of the other classes.

-Pyro: a lot of people Haven't quite realized that the pyro isn't just for spy checking, stopping solly bombs, and occasional roaming. Though I think the pyro should do all those things, but I think the primary importance for pyro is to give your team ground combine the high dps and airblast ability and pyro is possibly the most effective push class in medium-short ranges. Add to it damage support from a demo and heavy and the cleanup of a good scout you have a recipe of forcing the enemy out of an area and possibly wiping them in the process. Though the Heavy is going to have to be more aware of the enemy solly and spy in this process. As far as I know -ts- in S8 was and has since been the only team that did this consistently.

-Soldier: Their main role is to watch the flanks, and occasionally get picks. Though some soldiers have been taking a newer approach to this. They've been using the Soldier as a distraction class. Not a class to get picks or really watch flanks, but as a tool of completely annoying and distracting the enemy team, dividing their attention and possibly pulling off 1-3 people from the frontline. Specifically vhalin was really good at doing this last season.

-Spy: As sneakypolarbear pointed out Evan adapted the meta of spy. Evan became a distraction class, rather than a pick class. Though he did get a lot of picks from his revolver, most of what he did was distract the enemy and didn't die in the process. In which his team made plays off of. Rather than the normal spy gets 1-2 key picks, team pushes into area.

-Scout: Pretty much what I said with the pyro, a pyro + scout are really good at taking forward ground and forcing the enemy out of the area. The scout can also utilize unlocks like Bonk to be a distraction or intel gatherer.

As far the other classes Engi MIGHT be able to change the meta with the rescue ranger, but I am unsure how. Sniper idk how they can do much other than get picks and throw piss. Medic meta changes are highly unlikely and would probably be really ineffective anyway.

class roles seem pretty locked for all the reasons listed above, at least until the dm in ugc gets better. it just seems that a lot of classes are capable of things that no one wants to experiment with right now. like TMP mentioned once that ubering pyro to gain ground was extremely effective but no one would want to try that in an actual match where it matters, you know?

--

Please don't laugh... but I think pyro has some ~hidden potential~

reflect rocket jumping is pretty underutilized. I think its the most underrated skills for pyro tbh. Yesterday I was playing in tf2mix and I went pyro to mid, reflect rocket jumped across the point and airblasted the team through choke and kept them out. I think that highlander is going to get more aggressive and pyros will have to play more aggressive and be more mobile to keep up.

-ts- did this in almost every match in S8

I got a Your Eternal Reward spree in my pl_barnblitz match.

BREAKING HIGHLANDER META

also:

Cygnus if youre reading this i hope you realize how many people you are disappointing by not using GHOST more often on BPM.

But that requires getting fed a rocket in order to move quickly.

i subbed soldier for wild on koth_lakeside and did really well playing more of a roamer role with shotty if that counts

1)It's tf2mix, tf2mix is really bad.
2)The soldier needs to feed you a rocket, which isn't going to happen (smart soldiers anyway) unless hes bombing/shooting one of your important classes (med/demo/sniper?)
3)It's tf2mix..

And lets say you do pull off a reflect rocket jump on mid. Some of the high level snipers in ugc can get a midair headshot on this pyro. The pyro could also get called out more then easily and shot by the heavy/scout/minisentry/pretty much anything that could look up into the sky.

In that case you'll die and the enemy soldier/scout/spy has a chance to get your med or demo in this mid fight. Something like that will never work unless the enemy team has autism.

The ambassador is a fine weapon but for my purposes it does not help me "reliably" when a scout or pyro are up close and on me. The point of dr spycicle revolver is to be able to do damage fast, give information on the enemy uber percentage/sniper location, and also survive. A good example would be finding out the enemy medic has 90 percent uber, calling it out, and then engaging on the medic. Notice there is no time to line up my shot in this scenario, rather my goal is to shoot the med a few times, bring the heavies attention onto me and allow a jumper to have a better shot at dropping the med. The revolver is much better in fast paced situations where you make a call and you go with it while the ambassador is better for situations where you get the headshot and then you tell your team to push.

I mentioned survival as well and the revolver when running away from a pyro or scout does not need to kill those individuals to be effective. For instance putting one or two shots long range on a scout as he is pursuing you will deter him from rushing in giving you enough time to perhaps charge your dead ringer or find cover where you can keep him at distance, poking your head out to put out one of those damaging 40- 60 damage shots on the scout. It is much easier to land a bodyshot with a faster and more damaging item then the ambassador so the revolver deters better leading to better survivability, allowing you to be involved a greater percentage of the time in team fights where the revolver shines as a clean-up item. In addition if the pursuing enemies overextend because they think you are weak as a spy, you can take down a pyro or scout before the team fight and give your team an excellent advantage where as an ambassador would have less of a chance of doing this.

1) HL is UGC, the majority of UGC is really bad.
2)I get fed rockets all the time when I play pyro in highlander.
3)Its ugc...

Yeah some of the good snipers can headshot you in midair but thats not very likely even for the best of them. You are right about getting destroyed by the heavy and minisentry. I still think that there are many situations where it can be effective as a surprise tactic.

It works in pubs because people don't react properly. If you think for a moment that pyro can do SHIT with jumps other than reposition/escape, you're vastly over-rating the class.

GHOST disappeared the day after being added to the roster for weeks, came online for a day and has now been offline for 37 days straight.

That's a good point. Hadn't really considered the disadvantage of the ambassador in that regard.

--

I don't believe bullet spread applies to the revolver in comp. It DOES apply to the ambi iirc