HypnosisFX
11-16-2007, 11:37 AM
This was posted over at Steam Community :: Group :: TeamFortress2 (http://www.teamfortress2.us)
Player named Thing 1:
So, you want to put your mind to work tinkering with mechanics that kill instead of being a big dummy walking around with explosive things strapped to your body? Good man! Now you're thinking - which is the first step to becoming a brilliant engineer!
The second thing you need to do is realize you're part of the team and being part of the team means that you need to be pulling your weight. In capture the point games, Building your own little equipment nest waaay in the back behind all the fighting does very little good for your team - everyone is needed in the fight *where* the fight is. Yes, this means that you'll have to be constantly destroying your own equipment to move up with the fight and it also means that you'll have to repair the equipment more and be very vigilant. An advantage of working up front with the team is that you'll have fewer spy problems because you'll have players around that can help out if a spy starts sapping your equipment.
Now, onto specific tricks and tips of the trade
1: If you're looking to establish yourself up front the first thing you need to do is pick a good spot. Think about how your enemy is going to attack you and your equipment. If you've got your little fort all set up correctly your biggest worry is going to come from ranged attacks - so the trick is to get set up in a spot that doesn’t give the enemy a line of fire that is beyond the range of your sentry gun's detection. To put it simply, if your guns cant reach them and they can reach you its a bad position.
You also want to pick a spot that affords both you and your gun protection from splash damage as well - clever players will use splash damage to kill you and your guns - limit your exposure to splash attacks by building in cubbyholes or other protected areas. Building your gun against an open wall increases splash damage and allows grenades that miss you the first time to bounce back and get you.
2. Build a dispenser first. Without metal you're nothing but another guy running around with his pants on fire and no one to put out the flames. You dont want to have to go very far away from your equipment if you can help it. A dispenser takes 100 metal. After the dispenser is up you can build a sentry with the metal you have left over and the first load of metal your dispenser puts out to you.
3. Hammer away with your wrench at everything to make it go up faster. You can build much, much faster if you keep hitting things with your hammer as it is building. The added advantage to this is that you can also repair it as its being built - so when that sentry gun is going up if it takes damage you're repairing it AND you're helping it get built faster.
4. Protect your dispenser by putting it behind you and your gun but with in reach so that you're always able to hit your gun and your dispenser with your wrench. Without your dispenser you get no more metal and you get no more healing. Your dispenser is just as important as your sentry gun if you're a true combat engineer. This comes in very handy when a pyro rushes your position - your dispenser heals you immediately and puts out flames as well.
5. Put teleporter exits near your equipment. You may be able to put one up further but this also puts you out of sight and out of mind - leaving you to deal with enemies with less team support. If a team member of yours teleports in and sees you fighting spies off he's more likely to lend a hand - the enemy is in sight! If I can manage it I will place my teleporter exit exactly in the center of my nest where I'm at - this makes players teleport right on top of you.
6. SQUAT! Keep your noggin protected at all times from enemy snipers. Duck behind your gun and/or dispenser! Snipers have a hard time taking you out when you're hidden. Your equipment can withstand a full shot from a sniper - you cant.
7. Being attacked - not all attacks will allow you to sit back and hammer merrily away at your sentry gun. Some attacks require you to get out and fight for your very life instead of hiding.
How to handle demoman attacks: One of the worst situations to be in is where a demoman can place sticky bombs near enough to you that they can take you out with splash damage - one of the unfortunate things about building up front is that this attack is one of the most effective ones for knocking you out - so when you see sticky bombs being placed you need to immediately leave your safe position and go on the assault - its either you or him and it is life and death. Your goal is to either kill him outright or force him to retreat or into the line of fire of your sentry gun.
How to handle spy attacks: A spy can sit there and sap your gun as fast as you can remove his sappers. Sappers damage your equipment over time and also render it where it will not operate. A sapped sentry is a non-functioning sentry. A sapped teleporter will not teleport. You've got to kill the spy ASAP. Once you've killed the spy the order of importance for removing sapper charges is this: Your sentry gun, your dispenser and then your teleporter. The reason for this? More than likely you're going to have some metal on you and even if your dispenser and teleporter goes down more than likely you'll pick up enough scraps to get your dispenser back up and also have enough left over to repair your damaged equipment.
A special note about pyros: They have the potential to be more devastating that any class in the right situation. A pyro can charge you and your level 1 sentry gun and kill you both before your gun will take him out. If you've got a level 1 gun and a pyro is charging you you must shoot at him to help your gun - then move back to repairing and upgrading.
As for the rest - If you've built your gun in a tight enough spot that other enemies cannot attack your gun without being hit by your gun then just keep your head down and keep swinging your wrench to repair your equipment! You can outlast their damage (even uber if you've got a level 3 sentry) and kill them just by keeping your head down and your wrench swinging!
8. Let your dispenser fill up with metal - the last thing you want to happen is for your dispenser to be out of metal when an enemy attacks - you need it ASAP for repairing your equipment. If its not there, you're going to be in a world of hurt. So as your dispenser is charging up and if you have the chance run out and grab nearby metal. This allows your dispenser to build up its supplies instead of you draining it when its not necessary.
9. If its possible build your equipment "nest" around a spot where health and/or ammo crates spawn. If a spot is nice and protected and also has a spawn point for health and metal sit right there and build your equipment nest around you - this takes the load off of your dispenser and allows you to keep your equipment repaired even faster. However the first rule is to build your equipment in a place where you cannot be attacked long range without your guns firing back - there is no exception to this rule!
10. Demoralize your enemy! Besides being a force to be reckoned with on the combat field be very miserly when it comes to giving up points to the enemy - destroying your equipment gives much more points to enemy players than killing players on your team. If a spy manages to get sappers on your equipment and you know you cant make it there in time use your auto-destruct remotes to destroy your equipment before the sappers do! They get no points and no glory for it! You may choose to do this as well if you know your sentry is about to die and you cant get back in time to repair it. I do this a lot less often because I build my sentries in protected positions and more often than not it can kill an enemy without taking too much damage.
11. ROTATE your equipment by hitting your "special" key - you can make your equipment face any direction - cant squeeze in that cubbyhole and get your sentry built the right direction? Just hit the special key when you're getting ready to build it to rotate the directions of your plans. Also - this minimizes confusion when you set your teleporter exit - Point it the way you want your team to go!
Give a good engineer 30 seconds of free time and he'll be harder to get out than a tick if he's built up in a good position. Engineers can be one of the most effective players on a team if they are played right. If you get up front, take advantage of all you can and keep vigilant about your equipment being repaired and safe there is a good chance that you'll be on the MVP board when your team wins the round.
Bad engineers hurt the team more than anyone else - you take away combat strength and you don’t keep your troops moving up, healthy and under your sentry's safe umbrella. Think! Act! Be brave!
Player named Thing 1:
So, you want to put your mind to work tinkering with mechanics that kill instead of being a big dummy walking around with explosive things strapped to your body? Good man! Now you're thinking - which is the first step to becoming a brilliant engineer!
The second thing you need to do is realize you're part of the team and being part of the team means that you need to be pulling your weight. In capture the point games, Building your own little equipment nest waaay in the back behind all the fighting does very little good for your team - everyone is needed in the fight *where* the fight is. Yes, this means that you'll have to be constantly destroying your own equipment to move up with the fight and it also means that you'll have to repair the equipment more and be very vigilant. An advantage of working up front with the team is that you'll have fewer spy problems because you'll have players around that can help out if a spy starts sapping your equipment.
Now, onto specific tricks and tips of the trade
1: If you're looking to establish yourself up front the first thing you need to do is pick a good spot. Think about how your enemy is going to attack you and your equipment. If you've got your little fort all set up correctly your biggest worry is going to come from ranged attacks - so the trick is to get set up in a spot that doesn’t give the enemy a line of fire that is beyond the range of your sentry gun's detection. To put it simply, if your guns cant reach them and they can reach you its a bad position.
You also want to pick a spot that affords both you and your gun protection from splash damage as well - clever players will use splash damage to kill you and your guns - limit your exposure to splash attacks by building in cubbyholes or other protected areas. Building your gun against an open wall increases splash damage and allows grenades that miss you the first time to bounce back and get you.
2. Build a dispenser first. Without metal you're nothing but another guy running around with his pants on fire and no one to put out the flames. You dont want to have to go very far away from your equipment if you can help it. A dispenser takes 100 metal. After the dispenser is up you can build a sentry with the metal you have left over and the first load of metal your dispenser puts out to you.
3. Hammer away with your wrench at everything to make it go up faster. You can build much, much faster if you keep hitting things with your hammer as it is building. The added advantage to this is that you can also repair it as its being built - so when that sentry gun is going up if it takes damage you're repairing it AND you're helping it get built faster.
4. Protect your dispenser by putting it behind you and your gun but with in reach so that you're always able to hit your gun and your dispenser with your wrench. Without your dispenser you get no more metal and you get no more healing. Your dispenser is just as important as your sentry gun if you're a true combat engineer. This comes in very handy when a pyro rushes your position - your dispenser heals you immediately and puts out flames as well.
5. Put teleporter exits near your equipment. You may be able to put one up further but this also puts you out of sight and out of mind - leaving you to deal with enemies with less team support. If a team member of yours teleports in and sees you fighting spies off he's more likely to lend a hand - the enemy is in sight! If I can manage it I will place my teleporter exit exactly in the center of my nest where I'm at - this makes players teleport right on top of you.
6. SQUAT! Keep your noggin protected at all times from enemy snipers. Duck behind your gun and/or dispenser! Snipers have a hard time taking you out when you're hidden. Your equipment can withstand a full shot from a sniper - you cant.
7. Being attacked - not all attacks will allow you to sit back and hammer merrily away at your sentry gun. Some attacks require you to get out and fight for your very life instead of hiding.
How to handle demoman attacks: One of the worst situations to be in is where a demoman can place sticky bombs near enough to you that they can take you out with splash damage - one of the unfortunate things about building up front is that this attack is one of the most effective ones for knocking you out - so when you see sticky bombs being placed you need to immediately leave your safe position and go on the assault - its either you or him and it is life and death. Your goal is to either kill him outright or force him to retreat or into the line of fire of your sentry gun.
How to handle spy attacks: A spy can sit there and sap your gun as fast as you can remove his sappers. Sappers damage your equipment over time and also render it where it will not operate. A sapped sentry is a non-functioning sentry. A sapped teleporter will not teleport. You've got to kill the spy ASAP. Once you've killed the spy the order of importance for removing sapper charges is this: Your sentry gun, your dispenser and then your teleporter. The reason for this? More than likely you're going to have some metal on you and even if your dispenser and teleporter goes down more than likely you'll pick up enough scraps to get your dispenser back up and also have enough left over to repair your damaged equipment.
A special note about pyros: They have the potential to be more devastating that any class in the right situation. A pyro can charge you and your level 1 sentry gun and kill you both before your gun will take him out. If you've got a level 1 gun and a pyro is charging you you must shoot at him to help your gun - then move back to repairing and upgrading.
As for the rest - If you've built your gun in a tight enough spot that other enemies cannot attack your gun without being hit by your gun then just keep your head down and keep swinging your wrench to repair your equipment! You can outlast their damage (even uber if you've got a level 3 sentry) and kill them just by keeping your head down and your wrench swinging!
8. Let your dispenser fill up with metal - the last thing you want to happen is for your dispenser to be out of metal when an enemy attacks - you need it ASAP for repairing your equipment. If its not there, you're going to be in a world of hurt. So as your dispenser is charging up and if you have the chance run out and grab nearby metal. This allows your dispenser to build up its supplies instead of you draining it when its not necessary.
9. If its possible build your equipment "nest" around a spot where health and/or ammo crates spawn. If a spot is nice and protected and also has a spawn point for health and metal sit right there and build your equipment nest around you - this takes the load off of your dispenser and allows you to keep your equipment repaired even faster. However the first rule is to build your equipment in a place where you cannot be attacked long range without your guns firing back - there is no exception to this rule!
10. Demoralize your enemy! Besides being a force to be reckoned with on the combat field be very miserly when it comes to giving up points to the enemy - destroying your equipment gives much more points to enemy players than killing players on your team. If a spy manages to get sappers on your equipment and you know you cant make it there in time use your auto-destruct remotes to destroy your equipment before the sappers do! They get no points and no glory for it! You may choose to do this as well if you know your sentry is about to die and you cant get back in time to repair it. I do this a lot less often because I build my sentries in protected positions and more often than not it can kill an enemy without taking too much damage.
11. ROTATE your equipment by hitting your "special" key - you can make your equipment face any direction - cant squeeze in that cubbyhole and get your sentry built the right direction? Just hit the special key when you're getting ready to build it to rotate the directions of your plans. Also - this minimizes confusion when you set your teleporter exit - Point it the way you want your team to go!
Give a good engineer 30 seconds of free time and he'll be harder to get out than a tick if he's built up in a good position. Engineers can be one of the most effective players on a team if they are played right. If you get up front, take advantage of all you can and keep vigilant about your equipment being repaired and safe there is a good chance that you'll be on the MVP board when your team wins the round.
Bad engineers hurt the team more than anyone else - you take away combat strength and you don’t keep your troops moving up, healthy and under your sentry's safe umbrella. Think! Act! Be brave!