I wish this were real with all my engy heart.

[ryodoan]

Man... If I could have one thing added to the game, this might be it

Youtube - Flamethrower Sentry

[Narkissus]

I dunno, very short range, easy to kill it.. way too easy.
But still perhaps thats one of the engineers upgrades!

[Shmitz]

I was thinking the other day that I would love the option to, instead of upgrading to the normal level 3 sentry, keep it as level 2 but add a device that would cause anything nearby to catch on fire if it got sapped (including the engineer, in the spirit of fairness).

[ryodoan]

I dunno, very short range, easy to kill it.. way too easy.
But still perhaps thats one of the engineers upgrades!

But see, thats because your not thinking like an engineer, you would not place this guarding a large, open room, instead you would put this in a confined space like around a bend in a tunnel, or protecting the entrance to a base. It would do more damage at close range to an attacker but be more vulnerable to long range attacks.

One of the engineer upgrades I would want to see is the ability to build 3x level 1 turrets instead of 1x level 3 turret.

[phatal]

I love that turret.

I really like the idea of 3 level 1 sentries. I'd say 3 level ones are much better than 1 lvl 3. With placement it would be really hard to get all 3.

[Shmitz]

I love that turret.

I really like the idea of 3 level 1 sentries. I'd say 3 level ones are much better than 1 lvl 3. With placement it would be really hard to get all 3.

Maybe this might be true in rare situations, where you're trying to guard an area not frequently traveled by the enemy. I've seen plenty of games where 3 engies all rush in and place three level 1 turrets and they all get completely destroyed in seconds, where if they had pooled their metal and created one level 3 turret, it would have survived, or at least taken down a couple enemies before getting blown up.

[ryodoan]

Maybe this might be true in rare situations, where you're trying to guard an area not frequently traveled by the enemy. I've seen plenty of games where 3 engies all rush in and place three level 1 turrets and they all get completely destroyed in seconds, where if they had pooled their metal and created one level 3 turret, it would have survived, or at least taken down a couple enemies before getting blown up.

Yes, but that is only really a problem in a couple situations:

Start of the game when the first enemy wave is coming and the rest of your team does not hold them back.
Just after having your defenses smashed and starting to rebuild.But you also have to look at it as now, while you had 3 level 1 turrets and 3 engineers none of them had metal left to repair their sentries since they were busy building them. Also you had 3 engineers, that would be 9 level 1 turrets now.

However, that said i do agree that in the end it would probably not be as efficient at killing as a level 3 sentry, and would probably be easier to destroy than a level 3 as well. However, now that people are getting good at destroying sentries, I think 3 level 1's would instead work better at slowing down an enemy advance. Instead of just having to poke your head around a corner a couple times to destroy one sentry, you now need to poke your head around a lot to destroy three sentries.

All together, I would rather have this flame turret than 3x level 1 turrets.

Or, a new kind of turret that we could have 3 off, say a 1 gattling cannon turret, so instead of having 2 gattling cannons per Level 2 / Level 3, you now can build 3x Level 1.5 turrets that have a gattling cannon turret, or something like that.

[Shmitz]

However, now that people are getting good at destroying sentries, I think 3 level 1's would instead work better at slowing down an enemy advance. Instead of just having to poke your head around a corner a couple times to destroy one sentry, you now need to poke your head around a lot to destroy three sentries.

I'm still not sure I agree with this. Level 1 sentries are extremely weak. My experience indicates just about every class can go toe-to-toe against a level 1 sentry and win. Poking your head around the corner is even easier, particularly since you can see where the engy is and shoot at the ones he can't repair right away. Even if all three of them are shooting at the opponent at once, he's taking less damage than if it were a single level 3 sentry. If he's got a medic healing him from behind the corner, the sentries are as good as gone even without an uber.

About the only real advantage I can see of having 3 level 1s is that you can spread them out to make sure one spy can't just run up and disable 100% of your defensive fire with a single sapper.

[Narkissus]

I dunno, as a soldier its extremely easy to take out a sentry, especially if they are just around a corner, shoot the ground near it while it cant see you and it usually kills everything quite nicely. And that would make this sentry still crap, other then one kill randomly as someone rushes past the corner before they realize its there.

As for level one sentries, thats a load, i can run up and bonesaw a level one sentry to death before it even kills me, in a wide open room. Whereas with the higher level ones you atleast get lots of pushback as well. although i have seen some punched to death by a heavy before.

[Youme]

As a pyro I can easily kill a lvl 1 sg whilst lvl 2 I need to know its there before I attack and I need to come from a behind angle, but its quite doable. A lvl 3 sg takes quite a bit of skill to take down as a pyro but I've done it many times and I'm sure many times in the future. However it always depends on where the sg is, if its in a good location its easy picking but if its got a really good spot to attack from I've got no chance. SGs need to be placed in the right place to be effective, I doubt that a flamethrower sg would be of any real use. I do, however, like the idea of a sg that has a defence mechanism to defend against sapping, of course it would needto hurt any player that happened to be near it to make it fair.

[Spike]

engis are overpowered, sentry upgrades would ruin the game

[Scotland Tom]

Engies are not overpowered. When a skilled pyro can take down sentires, and any halfway decent demoman, soldier or heavy/medic team can take them down as well, the engineer is hardly overpowered. The only engineers that may seem overpowered are the skilled ones who can put themselves in the best positions. Even then, it's not the class that's overpowered, it's the skill of the engineer.

[Youme]

engis are overpowered, sentry upgrades would ruin the game

my entire message, the one before yours totally disproves this. A pyro can take down lvl 3 senteries... thats someone using flame alone can take down one of those rocket firing minigun machines.
Engineers aren't over powered, they are very well balanced and as cool as extra additions to SGs would be they would probably end up hugely imbalenced because we havent got the resources to test them thouroughly like valve do. You know why the new medic stuff is taking so long to come thought the pipeline? because they are making sure they don't imbalence the game. And although they may be months overdue I have every confidence in valve that they will keep the game as balanced as it is now.

[DJive]

I've never had a problem taking out a sentry placed anywhere on a Valve map as a Heavy. They do a great job like Youme said to balance the game out.

[Spike]

My favourite class is Pyro and you can't take down lvl 3 sentrys. You only can if the sentry is near a corner, but trying to kill a sentry running to it is complete suicide, the bullets stops you.

BTW I was not talking about that. I'm talking about the spy vs engis. Spys (my 2nd favourite class) are supposed to be the ones who kill sentrys, deserve a separate mention of the difficulty of this class, almost all the time is impossible to take down the sentrys. And don't tell me "you have no spy skills" cause is not true.

There are 2 ways for destroying the sentrys:
1)put the sapper first and then kill the engi. Yeah, it's supposed to be easy but it's not, backstabs are difficult when you have an engi (or more + rest of the team) running to repair the sentry and hitting with the wrench. Backstabs are sometimes buggy, and the funny thing about that if you want an instant kill you have to hit them in the back, but an engi will kill a spy with 1 or 2 wrench hits, and it has the biggest critical rate, so almost all the time 1 hit will kill you wherever it hits you.

2) killing the engi and then put the sapper before the sentry turns back. 80% of the times is suicide with lvl 2 and lvl 3 sentrys.

That's why I call them overpowered.

Sorry about my bad english

[Shmitz]

You do realize that chain sapping a sentry will kill it in 2-3 saps, regardless of how much the engineer bangs on it, right? I also speak from experience when I say the crit rate on the wrench is nowhere near what you describe. Believe me, I wish it was, but it's not.

As far as dealing with an engineer when he has teammates around, well, there's the balance. The way to beat an engy who has supportive teammates is to become a spy who has supportive teammates. Coordinate with your team so that they can come in guns blazing once you've placed the sapper, and they'll be able to take it down before the engineer has a chance to remove it.

[Spike]

chain sapping will kill the dispensor, not the sentry, engis are always repairing them, and they will kill you before you can destroy them.

And yes, I know wrench is arround 16% critical rate, but 1 normal hit does lot of damage and can kill a spy easy.

And yes, coordination is the key, and belive me I try, but nobody wants to hear spys, they pay lot of attention to medic ubers but not to spys. I'm trying it all the time but seems I'm always on an idiot team.

I'll think engi is uberpowered until valve fix buggy backstabs and sappers damage or health.

[Fireman]

If you're going to be chain sapping, that implies that you're going for the sentry before the engie, so your disguise will still be good and the sentry itself won't be giving you too much trouble. If there's two engies repairing the sentry, then you definitely won't be able to get it down in time, and should either go for an engie backstab....or go find yourself another target.

You're most likely not going to find many willing to coordinate with a lone spy on a pub server. Try playing on some clan servers for better luck, those usually (in my experience, anyway) have people that are more experienced in working together as a team and coordinating assaults.

Engies are fine imo, they really shine when paired with a good defense, while not being too powerful for a strong offense to overrun.

[Narkissus]

My favourite class is Pyro and you can't take down lvl 3 sentrys. You only can if the sentry is near a corner, but trying to kill a sentry running to it is complete suicide, the bullets stops you.

BTW I was not talking about that. I'm talking about the spy vs engis. Spys (my 2nd favourite class) are supposed to be the ones who kill sentrys, deserve a separate mention of the difficulty of this class, almost all the time is impossible to take down the sentrys. And don't tell me "you have no spy skills" cause is not true.

There are 2 ways for destroying the sentrys:
1)put the sapper first and then kill the engi. Yeah, it's supposed to be easy but it's not, backstabs are difficult when you have an engi (or more + rest of the team) running to repair the sentry and hitting with the wrench. Backstabs are sometimes buggy, and the funny thing about that if you want an instant kill you have to hit them in the back, but an engi will kill a spy with 1 or 2 wrench hits, and it has the biggest critical rate, so almost all the time 1 hit will kill you wherever it hits you.

2) killing the engi and then put the sapper before the sentry turns back. 80% of the times is suicide with lvl 2 and lvl 3 sentrys.

That's why I call them overpowered.

Sorry about my bad english


I play spy mainly and it is quite easy to kill an engy then sap a sentry before it even turns around, either you got lag issues or your trying to do things while the sentry is pointing right at your head.

Also a pyro can kill a sentry easily by running circles around it, ive done it as a scout too, you can run circles around it and it has trouble keeping up with you so it doesnt shoot.

[Spike]

Ok I think you haven't understand me. I'm telling that engi vs spy is unbalanced because some things need to be fixed on spys, the most important of them is the buggy backstabs. I'm happy because I've just have pwned as spy and I've equaled my point record (17), but sometimes you want to take down an engi base and jump on top of an engi, backstab him on the head and nothing happens.

[MacNetron]

As a medic I already think I get backstabbed too much...
Second, the head of an engi being on top of him, is not on the back... Basically people have 6 sides (like a dice). The top != the back.

Last, the flame sentry. I think pyro-medic-combo will take out any flame sentry with ease.
That doesn't mean I don't like the idea :) But it might make sentry-vulnerable classes like the scout even more vulnerable to sentries.

[Spike]

As a medic I already think I get backstabbed too much...
Second, the head of an engi being on top of him, is not on the back... Basically people have 6 sides (like a dice). The top != the back.



yeah but medics are our best victims :tongue_smilie:

And a headstab is like a backstab, if you jump on a character and stab him, you will see the knife movement of a backstab, and the sound when hitting them too, but nothing happens.

[Scotland Tom]

Spike, as one who plays an engineer I can tell you that spies can get backstabs even when it looks like they are standing in FRONT of me. Perhaps backstabs are a bit buggy, but a good spy is the bane of my existence as an engineer. I've seen a single spy take out two engineers AND all their equipment without an issue. Chain sapping is an excellent technique as an engineer simply can't keep up with the repairs, especially if the spy is chain sapping both the dispenser AND the sentry. One of the worst situations for me as an engineer is a spy running amok by chain sapping all my stuff. I just can't repair it fast enough.

Again, perhaps backstabbing is a bit buggy currently, but that doesn't mean the engineer is overpowered against the spy. Mostly it comes down to skill level. Honestly, if the map is balanced well, any spy worth his salt can be a real headache for the opposing engineers.

[MrAlBobo]

just want to say...its undeniable that the spies backstab is buggy, but as long as you don't have ping over 100 its buggy in favor of the spy
its quite funny to see all the frontal backstabs you can get

[ryodoan]

Yeah, A good spy can take out an entrenched engineer and can be quite annoying. I have yet to really find a place on any map that it is impossible to remove an engineer and that includes custom maps. I have played on custom maps that are really easy for an engineer where I have been able to sit in one location for most of the game, but the thing is once the other team learns the map they start to coordinate themselves.

As for spy backstabs they are unbalanced right now and in my opinion buggy in the favor of spies. I have lost count of the number of times I have been "backstabbed" in the side, where they are not behind me but still get a backstab kill.

I am more worried about spys than ubers. The only real uber I am afraid of is an Uber Pyro. An uber heavy is a joke if I am hiding behind my sentry, I can repair it faster than you can kill it, uber demo man is only a danger if they use their stickies which 90% of them dont do, or dont do fast enough, uber soldiers tend to only get off a couple rounds that hit me so I do alright against them. But Uber Pyros are scary, they can run up and toast me + sentry gun at the same time and do it fast.

A spy + pyro is crazy scary, I will be running around repairing my sentry and wacking the spy with my wrench and then the pyro comes running in and toasts me.

Overall I see the engineer as a delaying tactic, because at this point after the release of TF2 most people have figured out how to get around sentry guns but it just takes them a little bit to accomplish that.

As for a lone pyro vs. Sentry gun that only works if the engineer is not really smart and places the turret to close to an entrance.

Overall I think the worst enemy of a sentry gun is its range. Most custom mappers think an easy way to put a check against a sentry gun is to make the strong points in their maps have entrances just out of reach of the ideal sentry placement. This is annoying because then the sentry guns are essentially useless there. Its not that hard for a simple combination of enemy forces to really crush an unsupported sentry gun as it is and to throw the range card at it is just not fair.

[Spike]

just want to say...its undeniable that the spies backstab is buggy, but as long as you don't have ping over 100 its buggy in favor of the spy
its quite funny to see all the frontal backstabs you can get

Almost all frontal backstabs are "facestabs" or backstabs before you turn around.

Yeah, i know spys can pwn, I always pwn as spy on official maps because I know them all and i've made my own strategies, but there are things that makes me angry, like beeing behind 4 enemies , backstabing them all and not getting any kills because the lag or buggy backstabs. Take a look at this video and you will see what I'm talking about:

YouTube - warpback

YouTube - TF2 Badlands Spy

[Narkissus]

That first video is just the spy being too far away, you can see that easily. And the second showed a guy that lagged when he went in to backstab people. I dont see it. But yeah, as a main spy i have many many backstab problems, but more noticably is that i can jump into a group of 6 people and just start swinging and get like 5 backstabs as they run around me because of facestabs randomly.

Thats how i got my high points on spy: 27 points :).

[ryodoan]

and in the second one he gets a side backstab when it did the normal stab animation. Also, in the 2nd one when he complains about the lack of a backstab after 3 tries he starts stabbing while he is to far away, then is stabbing him in the side, finally he gets behind the heavy and gets his backstab.

Oh, and he just stabbed a demo man on the side with a normal stab animation and got a backstab, pause it at 4:04, he is clearly not behind the demo man, and does not do the backstab animation, but gets a backstab. If anything, spies are balanced in their favor when it comes to getting backstabs.