see him playable as a class again?

what?

are you joking

paranoia has made disguises, and even cloaking, almost pointless. almost.

paranoia has made disguises, and even cloaking, almost pointless. almost.

no it hasn't!

Don't go through choke points, don't cloak at bad spots, cloak in such a way they have no clue which way you went if running away, if you're going to use a disguise, remember you're that disguise, so don't even flinch when you get shot at all (they wouldn't.), avoid pyros (pretty easy except on a mass pyro rush but if thats happening the game isnt very serious anyways.), learn to side stab & quickstab, learn the environment.

Spy is one of the best and balanced classes still, they don't even need an upgrade to their stuff though they will do one to make them more novice friendly since Spy is the most unfriendly class to novices.

disguises and cloaking are two of the most useful mechanics in the game, the problem is is they aren't very friendly to novices or unorganized teams where your teammates will easily blow your cover for you, especially other spies on the team. a team that communicates effectively, and a spy who knows the lay of the land, is two of the most dangerous things put together in one.

this is like saying scouts are terrible to be honest

No they aren't, they're really drat good, the problem is is they require buckets load more skill and knowledge to use than the other classes.

edit: accidentally double posted xD

the next update is still like a month away though considering how they've spent a lot of time helping the L4D crew instead of making the update.

Totally forgivable imo, since it will probably be the only game taking me away from tf2.

I was hoping spy would be up for next update, I've been waiting a long time to see him playable as a class again. The scout should still be a single class update though, because there will be a flood of scout players for the first 15 minutes until people realize the class actually takes skill and dedication to play well

Sounds like you're talking about the spy? Easily needs WAY more skill (backstabs and sneaking) and dedication (LOTS of bullshit deaths). The scout is pretty much a fast running engy with double jump and double cap.

paranoia has made disguises, and even cloaking, almost pointless. almost.

they see you in disguises if you don't act like the enemy team, like running from the opposite direction, or directly towards them. they see cloak only if you run into someone or get hit, otherwise you're still completely invisible while fully cloaked, priceless for getting behind the enemy lines and behind/outside their field of view. hell, you don't even need a disguise or cloak if youre a good enough spy. You spot a cluster of distracted enemies, flank them, and you get at least 1-2 backstabs before the rest of the group turns to kill you. FAR from pointless. You have either not played the spy much, or haven't been playing the game long enough to see how good spys play.

you know its a lot easier to play spy WITHOUT the disguise because all it does is it tricks you into a false sense of security which then affects your playstyle to a more aggressive approach.

The only use it really has is sentry shield.


Also throw the knife away because the revolver is like 10x better at achieving results, for example sniping buildings and engies and even snipers. Knife is just more like RUSH THROUGH ENEMIES AND REGARDLESS OF THE OUTCOME CLOAK AND RUN TO YOUR ALLIES!!!

Then again it's really easy to pick off like 6 guys with the knife in the Badwater Basin tunnel near the blue spawn when they are all busy gunning down sentry farms and pushkin the kart.

It only gives you a false sense of security if you let it. A good spy knows his disguise isn't perfect, but he's also not using it to idle around the enemy. He only needs it to get close enough to someone's back. Even if the enemy teammates spot you, it still reduced their reaction time, they're not absolutely sure youre a spy till they check you, any spy checks distracts them from any encounters they have with your teammates, and once you get that stab, you lose the disguise anyways. But you may still get extra kills due to teammates not noticing you, or not noticing you in time. The disguise isn't meant to trick, it's meant to delay, to give you that second of hesitation you need to get that stab.

As for pyros, their fire is deadly to spies, but pyros don't have spyproof armor or anything, they die like the rest. I can't tell you how many times I've had pyros spot me and i either fended them off while running backwards with the rifle, or running straight towards them for a 180 stab. It's a great feeling to die on fire, knowing you killed the pyro who did it to you with a backstab AFTER he saw you.

I dare anyone to say spy sucks on a server with me.
The problem doesn't rely solely on the Spy mechanics. Just like Scouts, Spies are only good on certain maps and in certain situations. Though a good spy is capable of handling any situation, regardless of the map.

Pyros are always going to be the Spies worst enemy, but they actually aren't too hard to kill. The revolver is really powerful, and can take them down in a few shots. And spies are meant for quick kills, not stalking the enemy team. The more time spent disguised leaves a higher chance of being discovered. That's why you cloak right behind the enemy, quickly backstab them, and run away while shooting your revolver at any enemies chasing you. Being hidden is a lot more important than being disguised, which is why you need to learn the maps when being a Spy. Also, disguising in things other than Pyro, Demoman, and Engineer help. Disguising as an enemy spy is probably the best disguise to use.

There are ways around the long backstab animation which is why I said learn to break it. You can either backstab early (ie: farther away from the back, it actually has some distance), or turn to the side very quickly and then back and slash (you won't get the long animation).

I think too many people get caught up on like points or UBER AMOUNTS OF KILLS LIKE EVERY OTHER CLASS when they are talking about Spy. Really if you even killed 2-3 people you accomplished your job as one, especially if you got rid of key people in the party. This is doubly true for Arena.

I'd rather not see spies become dumbed down because dumbed down classes suck and eventually become boring. It's why I hate playing Pyro, I feel like there's nothing I can learn from it except W + Mouse 1 and spin 360 degrees. Who cares if a good Spy is the rarest thing in the game, it doesn't mean they are bad, it means people need to learn how to play. Don't dumb down something because people can't figure it out or suck at it. That's like nerfing a class because everyone whines its overpowered because they can't beat it, except the inverse. All the spy needs to be truly successful is to fix the long backstab animation to be like the CS knife (does damage before the hit connects, so you won't get the stupid misses 24/7, don't remove it so that skillfull stuff like the previous two methods can be used by good spies.), and cabinets give you full cloak & friendly dispensers give you cloak (enemy ones doing it could be kinda iffy.). It's pretty obvious what the spy update stuff will be since they only get two whole items upgraded in their inventory, and given the history of what the updates are like. Every class becomes less effective over time because over time people figure out all the nuances of the game, this rings true for every class. The spy is heavily affected by this, but in the hands of a good player, they are deadly. The heavy is also very rare, along with the scout, and in the hands of good players both of those things rock VERY VERY hard.

They have a steeper learning curve than the other classes, so of course good players in these classes are rare. But that doesn't mean they aren't playable, they just require a bit of skill and learning to get good at.

on the inverse you have the most common class Engineer which you could get a Monkey to play half way decently, followed by the Pyro which like I said really is just W + Mouse 1 unless you want to get really fancy about it. Both of these classes are okay too, but they take substantially less skill & knowledge to play.

spies are fine, please don't overbuff something or w/e to dumb down a class too much (unfortunately i am pretty much afraid this is what Valve is going to do) just because good players are rare in it. eventually people will learn how to play one, and if they don't, their fault.

Man, I hope they don't dumb down the spy. His whole nature is subtlety, timing, and environmental awareness. It's like the last class you play after you got the hang of the other classes, because you really need to know a lot about every other aspect of the game to be a good one. You rarely think of everyone's line of sight as any other unit, and knowing what behaviors to expect from people both who have seen you, and have not seen you, becomes much more important than just leading your next shot. But, for a unit who depends on melee attacks from behind, I don't think they could make that part any easier, and thank god too.

even though it's obvious what the 2 items are i would not be surprised if they added something stupid like flame resistant jacket or something to remove one of the big weaknesses of the spy that you could get around by being half way decent anyways.

a lot of people say engies, pyros, and demos are imba and spys and scouts suck, more people play the former and less people play the latter. obviously valve is smart enough to know they aren't actually imba or suck, but one set of classes is substantially easier to be good at than the other, so they might try to make the less played classes easier to play. unless if they give us some really imbalanced shit, i don't play on using any spy upgrade shit. you can already easily get top spot (HURR GOAT MR SCORE 100+ POINTS IN A MAP YOU HATE SHOWING UP EVERYONE ELSE BY A LOT.) if you're good with the current stuff, and i really can't see them adding anything that would benefit an already good spy, just stuff that would ease spy stuff a bit like the silenced revolver & TFC knife.

but i could very easily see them making it a substantial difference and really dumb it down too but i hope they don't. what i like about the spy is even if you know your techniques there's still new little things you can learn as you play, because when you play spy you aren't really playing spy, you're playing 9 classes at the same time (well, technically 8, you'll never use the Medic disguise really. I still say they need to add a random ubercharge amount to it!!), and so you can learn quite a bit each time you play it. you barely have more hours in it than i do but you're obviously far superior at it than i am but i still learn a lot of stuff along the way.

meanwhile you pretty much can master pyro or engie in like less than a day lmao. i don't want spy or scout to be like that they are fairly difficult to play classes and i rly like that about them. ya it makes the top end pretty rare and hard to find, but it's a difficult class to play and thus the top end players when you do find one will easily stand out.

They're not going to dumb it down.
I mean obviously there's going to be a lot of people playing Spy when the new weapons come out, but they aren't going to make it easier for them. I think Valve knows what they're doing, especially with a class like the Spy. The thing about Spy is that players who HATE spies are always looking for ways to counter them. But usually the people who really know how to play Spy know this, and are always looking for ways to counter that and stay on top of the game. It's a never ending struggle basically.

i don't think there's anything wrong with that at all (the class being a literal science that requires exploiting game code to be successful).

people have been doing this in every fps ever since quake 1 in tournaments.

tho i disagree with you because i am pretty sure that is a disguise's intended effect (that's what its intended effect has been in every other TF at least, because the idea of a disguise actually being a safe protective thing for you is not possible.), the knife is easily one of their top 3 problems (seriously if they slightly move you miss.), and the cloak is easily worked around with map knowledge, and such.

basically the problem with the class is it has an obscene skill ceiling, and unlike the long backstab animation and their other countless bugs, it's something they should never ever fix. Fix the backstab animation at the least, but really you're never going to fix bullshit deaths especially when a lot of those are from voices you can't hear, the bizarre technicalities because all their stuff relies on reading people's minds in essence, and they don't have near worthless gear considering the knife is pretty much the best melee weapon to someone who knows how to use it, the revolver is the best pistol when aimed right, the sapper is pretty good, and the disguise case rules besides its cloak not filling up in cabinets.

seriously they could really just skip spies and give us no gear and I wouldn't even care. all the good ones would still be owning games like no tomorrow

Man, where does this W+M1 PYRO LOL originate from? I know the steam Tf2 forums are full of shit like it among other dumb whine topics but come on, seriously.

If a pyro runs at you with the trigger held 24/7 (LOL W+M1 LOLOLL) then what's the problem? You just kill him unless you have let him come so close to you that he can damage you in which case you can still kill him but the odds are against you (class specific offcourse). I know the flamer range is longer than what the visible effect lets you believe but it's still pretty short.

Also I keep hearing this IF PYRO GETS ME BY SURPIRISE ITS INSTAGIB THAT IS NOT FAIR shit but you know, if a demo or a soldier or a scout or even a fucking engineer gets you offguard they'll kill you too on the spot. But with pyro it's worse because because because... uh... because.... uh....???

Can someone explain this to me. Pyros can get kills easy lol easymode class. But I can pick a soldier or a demo and walk around (W) +shoot (M1) and I get a guaranteed kill, especially with demo whose nades damage varies from 100 to 200 and hidden stickyspots have unsurvivable splash damage (TF2 wiki can say whatever the fuck it wants, I've played pyro(175) and medic(150?) and demos(175) and they all can be one-shotted with a regular nade).

PS. I play mainly spy but the second most played is pyro and it's never as easy as w+m1.

From what I've read at the steam tf2 forums is that it's not an insult at bad pyros, it's a complaint/whine because people are apparently helpless against wm1 pyros and apparently that is the only thing you need to do to be successful (lot of frags, teamplay is irrelevant and is not related to success).

wowzers. come back and there's lotsa spy chat here.

well it's not a BAD class by any means. i like it a lot, but have just not used it much! and it's obvious to me that it can be a very good class if used well.
i'm just saying that spy-checking has become pretty rigorous, and not just for the pyros. obviously a good spy won't be affected too much, but it's still inconvenient and you can't always not let yourself be seen.

either way i'm using spy a bit more now because backstabs and revolver kills are satisfying as hell.

I don't play tf2 much atm but when I did spy was my fav class by far it rocks.

I hope they don't improve it too much.

I'm guessing sniper's going to get something in the way of spy relief tho

I think the w+mouse 1 came from when you walk around corners, or any other instance where you suddenly find yourself immediately very close to a pyro. ANY other unit will have to aim and fire, and should probably try to strafe to be a harder target to hit. All the pyro has to do is hold the fire button and have a very good chance of either beating them or seriously wounding them. Sure, you could do the axetinguisher combo, or back off once there on fire and finish  them off from a safe distance with shotgun, but those require skill. It's far too easy to get kills with a pyro as a noob. Look at target, run toward target, hold fire. This is the same tactic I see from people completely new at/horrible at FPS games. As far as close range combat goes, it's easy mode. You don't see a lot of people trying to melee pyros. As for pyros being good at ambushes, and I won't even mention how well the backburner helps, whatever life you survive the ambush left will be slowly diminishing from the DOT, and being on fire makes you a bright beacon for any other enemies to quickly finish you off.