do you think making engie that threatening/important is bad? i was under the impression that what you're describing can be applied to a good sniper too. pyros if positioned well can disrupt whole ubers, and so on. picks are important regardless of who it is simply because of raw manpower, as well.

the main damage class suddenly becoming not so main-damaging is kind of interesting, to say the least

everyone will use the shield one just like everyone uses the escape plan

i think at this point most people know to target the engie first. there was a small change during the summer that made it so a wrangled sentry drops its shield and activates almost immediately after killing the engie, which everyone took as an almost-buff, but to me it's more incentive to shoot down the engie and be able to clean up quickly. i get that the pistol never gets used, but i also don't think stock has to be dominant in its weapon slot. is there a difference between heavy never having to use a shotgun and this? is it just principle? i think weapons need to be compared to the game at large and not their counterparts.

when people talk about how they don't like the wrangler it's usually a list of its upsides. but that's just how it functions, why is it bad because of that? you can make a case for it being skilless to do well with, but in that sigafoo clip on barnblitz everyone brings up, the heavy/medic end up pressing less total combined buttons than he does.

i think there's a lot of annoying stuff in this game that players have to learn to take in stride, or lessen the impact of through help of their team mates. it's annoying that a single chokepoint gets shut down with minimal effort from a demo, it's annoying to get headshot from miles away (without taking raw skill into account).

most importantly i'd just like to see the short circuit given more time because it could end up being a healthy addition to HL

thanks for replying.

i've heard the wrangler been called all kinds of overpowered but every cast i've watched i've never seen teams have a problem facing it. (willing to provide examples) it kind of just serves as a temporary roadblock for an uber that was coming anyway. and this is because wrangler doesn't secure wins, your team does, and it's always been like this for engies, on a good team you prosper and on a bad team you're rushing to set up and being overwhelmed. you can theorycraft and call it potential bullshit but in practice i really have never seen the wrangler impede teams by itself.

i know valve can be a little slow in adjusting weapons (much less so this year, god bless them) and the fact that the wrangler hasn't gone through any changes (they basically reworked the soda popper which is something that hasn't been done for a long time, changing the upside of a weapon) is kind of evident that valve thinks the current wrangler is part of what keeps engie competitive. encounters with a sentry otherwise are pretty binary and most good players have no problem downing one. like it or not it DOES increase engie's skill ceiling, and i know how concerned players are with that phrase.

i'm going to say that fighting soldiers and demos on the flank is a lot like it was before with the new short circuit: if you maintained a good distance you were able to deny all 4 rockets/pipes and shotgun them down during their reload. the fire rate was still faster than rocket/pipe rate then. the increased attack interval doesn't change much, it just makes it easier. people underestimated how powerful it was. having four engies on a pub team m1ing into everyone doesn't help its current reputation, hah

i would love to hear from players who have used it in HL pugs

i'm pretty sure changing the short circuit was valve's way of lessening the impact of soldiers and demos on spammy pubs, without nerfing said classes. it's not really right to say it lowers the engie's skill ceiling; haphazardly spamming pills and getting cheap kills and using the sc are about on the same level. neither act may be "skillful" but they're skills in the game. i loved the short circuit before but now i think one has to make a serious decision between it and the wrangler. you still get fucked by focus fire, bullets, bison, and flames, (and even melee) and the range isn't that great for hitting people. it doesn't feel as clumsy as before (though it saw use), just really fun. this and the no-afterburn targe are strong signs that valve wants demoknight used more (for better or worse).

i always loved the banners, and now they're more defined in their roles and have those sweet passive bonuses to make them even more attractive. the liberty launcher and the concheror are a gruesome twosome. like a roamer that returns to the nest with a fresh batch of heals on-hit

sodie popper and diamondback are cool too

works with atomizer jump too

Do you think the Medic has a low skill ceiling, then? It's a little silly to judge individual skill ceilings when TF2 is all about class interplay. Plus, no other class has access to buildings, Engie's totally unique in those regards.

http://www.reddit.com/r/tf2/comments/1ltfbx/unpopular_opinions/cc2vfbj

Believe me, I recognize the utility and strength of the RL

you have a really narrow view of tf2. what i'm saying is "real". try playing stock engineer in a 5cp, it's grueling. engineer isn't just about sentry placement, an engineer that spams minis isn't going to get anything done (in a pub maybe). engies need to know when it's safe to haul, what placements are going to offer the best protection without being too vulnerable(often decided by a few inches), when to turtle or retreat leaving your buildings to be destroyed. do you build a tele at forward spawn or does the enemy team have enough momentum to push you back? and so on. yes you've got buildings to work for you but the best engineers do oh so much more micro-managing. plus, if your team's not on the ball, even a good engineer won't be able to get much done. if you're judging engineers off of dustbowl matches they aren't the most shining examples of good players.

and what's there to say regarding the huntsman, it takes much more skill than the rl to be effective at high levels, simple as that.

these are terrible (and erroneous) knee-jerk assessments of weapons. i'm so sorry the diamondback is overpowered. play a different game if you don't want sentry guns.

i love how someone earlier mentioned low level HLs are bind-spamming trolls because there's no difference in low level 6s, it's arguably worse from my experience.

that's a really close-minded viewpoint. i think the problem is so many people value DM over strategy that engineer, being almost strictly strat-oriented (though a good shotgun engie can get shit done) gets made fun of because of his "aimbots". 6s is just a way to escape the perceived "no-skill" classes, it's just kind of a childish thing, to stick one's hands over one's eyes and pretend these classes don't exist.

there's the argument that "this is slow, we need to speed up the game" but you run into problems when the game you're playing is slow by nature so you have to cut out classes.

a lot of 6s players are pretty scummy in the sense that they were fine with all these hidden sticky spots that valve fixed recently but probably would have bitched if they got killed with a huntsman arrow when something like the rocket launcher is 10 times as easy to use as the huntsman effectively aye yai yai

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lqLHsrDFAk0&feature=youtu.be

frags and ratings are inherently flawed because it's easy to write off a post with a ton of minus frags without giving it a fair chance, and vice versa. i think the plus frags for the OP were just saying like "hey thanks for letting us know" or something?

what ever happened to those pick/ban pugs? remember how excited and riled people got when sal came back with the comp news from valve, and how it seemed like big changes were afoot? i'd like to see less theorycrafting, more action, and more feedback. it might be hard work but dammit it's all beneficial to the game's growth. i want to see threads on this forum detailing strategies and some good concrete discussion, this is supposed to be the epicenter of comp tf2, no? threads on shirtless competitive players are fine too but i think a lot of the QF backlash can be attributed to pure laziness. if after extensive testing and feedback it truly is decided that it doesn't benefit 6s i'm fine with it being banned, but hard work is never a waste of time when you're helping the game we all love grow

ep, boston basher, gunboats

don't see why those weapons should get a pass just because they're the league's darlings

on top of that i'm reminded of all the whining when the EP got a (well-deserved) nerf, in contrast with the QF ruling. it's obvious so many competitive players pick favorites

making a decision like this is like getting all hot and bothered, then trying to talk rationally when you're still horny. should have jerked off first, then with peace of mind discussed the QF and its impact on the game