Hes got the airshots. Cant go wrong.

No love for the Fat Man I guess.

Class has real depth though, given the heavy having the most glaring strengths and weaknesses of any class: low mobility but hp pool and defensive damage (far more effective on people pushing into you). Having precise movement and intelligent positioning to minimize your weaknesses and play to your strengths makes a moderate but noticeable impact on a class that is admittedly fairly easy to play pretty well with good aim.

Looks like an old version of grape's hud, at least from the font.

Cheesy is my favorite

Clockwork's post is really thoughtful, and I think holds a really good perspective for evaluating the game. I would add that we should still think of tf2 as a game that the developers want to make as fun as possible without removing the element of rewarding skill growth. Balance changes may be few and far between, but I think valve has made some really smart changes in this update.

+20 HP on extinguish is an important pyro change. Inherently the only way friendly players are ignited is by another pyro. This change punishes pyro players who mindlessly light the enemy team on fire at every chance, and incentivizes pyro players to extinguish their team and to aggressively close out the fights they do choose to take.

Degreaser afterburn nerf is negligible and the game has so many mechanics for extinguishing oneself or healing through burn damage that afterburn has been become a less and less important mechanic as time has gone on for this game. Clockwork made a good point about this being a mechanic that allows players to find success even while they have limited experience or ability in the game, which is a healthy thing for games to have imo. I doubt that this change will meaningfully effect skillful pyro play. Afterburn at this point functions more as a status effect to disrupt aim and grant crit flares, at least on the degreaser.

Switch weapon speed is a buff (.67 to .5 seconds across the game) IN GENERAL to classes and loadouts that rely on combined use of multiple weapons (i.e. shotgun pocket has been slightly buffed relative to gunboats pocket because it has improved in potency while the loadout that requires no switching has remained the same). The combination of this buff with the nerf to "switch away" speed balances what I believe to be valves intention for granting the class some depth that it lacked in earlier iterations of tf2. The ability to instantly pop out one weapon after another on degreaser pyro was odd in that it essentially removed the skill in weapon management. Imagine what quake would be like if you could switch off weapons instantly after firing. Combining that with two guns that dont require any reloading (or much ammo management) and pyro recedes into the simplicity that belies its function as a support role for newer players.

The potency of airblast with respect to stuffing ubers in chokes is not to be understated, but I'm sure valve is aware how many people have really enjoyed full time mastering what is undeniably a class that makes the game accessible to beginners. Making pyro a close range DM monster without making that DM reliant on abusing the presently unique mechanics of the airblast (denying the ability to surf unlike any other kind of knockback in the game) is a path to promoting skill based distinctions between pyro players.

Overall, I think that shotgun pyro will become dominant as "flarepunching" has been made much more similar to hitting airshots given the increase in time from airblasting to flaring. A push for hitscan skill on pyro may promote interest in exploring the depth found in the core combat classes, while making pyro require more mechanical skill in general will allow for the depth that many desire on the class. Concerns about W+M1 are overstated, essentially every single hitscan weapon in the game (aimed well) can kite a pyro who is clearly telegraphing his intentions by rushing forward.

The immense superiority of players like Satan and grape over other pyros is evidence for the unexplored skill cap on pyro. Most highly skillful and motivated players quickly move to one of the core combat classes. A few players being highly successful through mastery of pyro mechanics should make more people aware of the potential of the class in a highlander setting (potential is essentially nullified outside of a niche role by the rapid style of 6v6 play).

TL;DR: Pyro class should be more reliant on shotgun dm or noticeable skill in hitting flares, this update accomplishes that.

EDIT: spelling & grammar + Last section

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In case you are interested in becoming a fan of the insane clown posse...

It's illegal but relatively easy. The guns still have this functionality, it just merely inhibited for models sold in America.

The "good guy guns" argument comes out every time people discuss gun control.

This argument, broadly, suggests that law abiding citizens using guns to defend themselves is necessary for the safety of our society. The problem with the argument is not this logic, it is how this logic is misapplied to argue against stricter gun laws.

Strict Laws don't stop the "good guys"
We aren't banning guns outright any time soon, if a "good guy" seeks a firearm to defend himself, he can undergo the background check and wait the waiting period. There's no reasoning as to why stricter gun laws at all reduce the ability of a "good guy" to acquire a weapon for self defense.

Not all firearms are created equally
Assault weapons are designed and built to offensively take human life. Are good samaritans pulling out a full-auto AK-47 with an extended magazine to stop a mugger coming at them with a 9mm? Do you load up your glock with teflon coated "cop killer" bullets (banned in only 7 states, conditionally in 2 of those) to defend yourself against a home invader? What about a automatic shotgun with a 30 round mag? These are all legally purchasable in the united states, and I'd argue that these guns are rather obviously doing more harm than good in society. The only justification for owning military assault weapons is that they are fun, weigh that against mass shootings and choose for yourself.

Some might argue that these weapons are necessary as a "check on the power of the state", but in this day and age that is just a joke. You gonna stop the government from driving an armored personnel carrier through your front door while watching you jack off with thermal imaging, with a rifle? Obviously the public can't be allowed to own anything powerful enough to really check a modern military state, so this notion has become obsolete. Guns aren't how we keep the government accountable any more, and we really should not want them to be.

Moreover, our poor mental health system in the US is NOT evidence for guns being innocent. Mental health issues certainly have had a role to play in many mass shootings and expanding the way that we care for and recognize those with mental health troubles is definitely a necessary reform. This does not discount the problem that many of those shootings are carried out with legally purchased guns, including the recent tragedy in San Bernadino.

source: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/10/03/us/how-mass-shooters-got-their-guns.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=image&module=b-lede-package-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0

Assuming the goal is to prevent mass shootings, doing so by identifying and stopping would-be shooters through a mental health system is nye impossible. That would require a fundamental rework of our health care system, one far more comprehensive than even what current single payer systems provide. In the case of mass-shootings, the perpetrators are often not criminals, with no access to the river of illegal guns that runs beneath every large American city. Stricter gun laws would in fact reduce these people's access to weapons, especially assault weapons with the greatest potential to take innocent lives in public spaces.

It should also be noted that the single most predictive variable when it comes to correlating firearm-related deaths is the gun ownership rate (http://www.amjmed.com/article/S0002-9343(13)00444-0/abstract). We may live in a society filled to the brim with guns (more than one per man, woman, and child in America), but that isn't a necessary reality.

EDIT: One final thought: mass shootings are a relatively new phenomenon. They started slowly in America, and now we are at the point of having more than one every day on average this year. The media won't stop putting these psychopaths on a pedestal of hatred (giving them the attention that they crave), and so new shooters won't stop appearing. Its getting worse; part of the conversation at this point has to be about damage control.

TL;DR: Our current notion of the second amendment (any guns, any time, for any one) is beyond absurd. Restricting gun ownership is not a constitutional violation.

Is anyone stupid enough to cut someone in the middle of a bo3?

Most of the advice in this thread is, in my opinion, not useful or informative. It seems to reflect people's personal experiences in developing their own style of playing TF2. I spent most of my time practicing mechanics in MGE on my path to improvement, and its something that I've thought a fair amount about.

The first thing you should do is type "hud_saytext_time 0, voice_enable 0" into the console. This will prevent you from talking or listening to anyone in the mge server. 99% of the time, you should not talk or listen to anyone in the mge server if you are really trying to improve. Not that some people are not helpful, but honestly there's just too many flaming idiots to play MGE for any length of time without muting them all.

The key to learning in MGE is focus. Its very very easy to slip into a rhythm and play mge mindlessly, but this way you will not improve very quickly. You will build muscle memory, but only as your unconscious mind begins to grasp the game. Every shot that you miss, you need to consciously think "why?". Just take a mental note of your mistake each time that you make one.

- He was in X position
- I was in Y position
- My rocket was sub-optimal because...

My point is not to push you to try to memorize every shot you ever miss (that's stupid), rather I'm advocating that you pay careful attention to everything you do wrong. Not to make some list that you might later refer back to, but just to engage your brain in actually understanding how to play better. When you go into a fight and die instead of fragging (you get 20 of these in every lost game of MGE), ask yourself why you lost? Maybe you missed all your rockets because his movement was too good; think about where you should have shot or what position you should have moved to to win the fight.

Building up the mechanics to execute fights the exact way that you plan to is a process that just takes time. Conscious engagement with this process helps you to at least build a framework for understanding how to make those "plans". I believe it was a chess master who described all processes of learning as fundamentally composed of four stages:

1: Unconscious Incompetence (you don't even know why you suck)
2: Conscious Incompetence (you know why you suck)
3: Conscious Competence (you know how not to suck)
4: Unconscious Competence (you just do it right)

The notion of conscious focus on mistakes and improvement is also very applicable to any time that you are playing tf2, not just MGE. In a match scenario, developing understandings of how the enemy team is playing individually can be extremely valuable if they allow themselves to become predictable (which the vast majority of players do).

TL;DR: The smarter and more focused you play, the better and more precise your aim will become.

Can't help you with airshots that shit is 100% muscle memory for me you just gotta practice practice practice. LUCKILY airshots don't actually win games much of the time. Focusing on ground game is just a LOT more applicable to actually being good at playing soldier (aka frag scouts).

im back

Good demo player, cool guy.

Can confirm bl4nk quote is legit to me on steam. Predicting 5-0 championships wooo!

Pocketed against him in a lobby (pcp cigarettes, hi). Has much potential.

the question of a generation lingers: will anyone?