By Kieron Gillen on July 9th, 2010 at 11:47 am.
We’ve only covered the Engineer Update a little because – oh, I don’t know. When Valve have got as good as playing their community as they are, seems that you’re surplus to requirements. And this one was expertly done, with the whole collection of Golden Wrenches building up to it – with the final heroes enshrined forever in this splendid list. I especially approve of crafter #97 “I Have Very Big Balls”. That you do, my friend, that you do. The full patch notes are here, if you want to get STRAIGHT TO THE FACTS. If you prefer a more scenic route, all the new weapons, achievements and maps are detailed here. And if you prefer experience to fancy-pants book-learnin’, you can just dive into the game and play the bloody thing. And, for a little RPS local colour, here’s the 2007 vintage Go Team! article Alec wrote about the joys of the Engineer. Anyone got any initial impressions?
09/07/2010 at 11:54 ChaK_ says:
who needs update?
WE NEED HATS VALVE ยง!
09/07/2010 at 11:54 itsallcrap says:
Doubt I’ll use the mini-sentry, somewhat agnostic to the new shotgun, but the Wrangler sounds like endless fun. Just need to remember to use it with your back to the wall….
09/07/2010 at 20:46 v.dog says:
Ditto. The gunslinger could be fun, but with a flashing light ‘Hi! I’m Here! Shoot Me!’, and half the damage of a level 1, it’s not just worth it. The hand looks very cool, tho’ (especially the taunt).
If they gave it level 1 damage, you could place 2 or 3 of them, or it could stick to walls and ceilings (or any combination thereof) it’d be awesome, while still balanced (no repair or upgade (level 3 makes a huge difference))
I can’t wait to get the wrangler tho- if fact, why am I still here? there’s milestone 3 to get!
09/07/2010 at 11:57 Tei says:
I approve of this :-)
I have still to see how it play in-game, but a quick deployable turret can enable some really fun engineer playing stiles,.. planting these turrets on the enemy base will be vicious. :-D
09/07/2010 at 11:59 Skinlo says:
A useful addition to an amazing hat simulator!
09/07/2010 at 12:00 Jon says:
I think the biggest change is the ability to move buildings. I can definitely see teams with one engineer building a teleporter whilst everybody else upgrades their level 3 sentry and then carries it through to the frontlines.
09/07/2010 at 13:10 VelvetFistIronGlove says:
Yeah, being able to move sentries is really useful. My standard offensive engineer approach on say, badwater (when on blue) is to build sentries on the front lines (usually only to level 2), then destroy them and build afresh close to more metal as the front line moves. Naturally that takes a lot of effort. Being able to pick up my sentry and move it forward (and crucially, into new locations where the enemy isn’t expecting it) is going to make huge changes.
09/07/2010 at 15:16 Arthur Barnhouse says:
It’s pretty great for spys too. Engineers can be a pain, especially if they work as a crew. Now, there is a reason for, say, two offensive engineers to split up as one moves forward to establish a new front line and one hangs back, keeping the teleporters running. As an added bonus, the engineer is slowed as he carries the sentry, and I get two points, one for him and one for the sentry.
This is about as close to Christmas in July you’re ever gonna get.
09/07/2010 at 15:21 Arthur Barnhouse says:
Sorry for the double post, but on the Engineer tip I think the biggest thing isn’t being able to move a level 3 Sentry but a Level 3 Dispenser. On offense, building a level 3 Dispenser, letting it fill up with metal, and then packing it up and moving close to the front line is a pretty useful, especially if you can get a Pyro or Heavy to defend for a few seconds as you turtle up. and I mean just a couple of seconds, because the level 3 dispenser assures a base can be built with incredible swiftness.
09/07/2010 at 12:07 Tei says:
Re: chizu
Also, congratas again :-)
09/07/2010 at 12:09 kakarik0 says:
My first impression is that the ability to move buildings is extremely unbalanced for a few reasons;
- Picking up a Sentry is instantaneous, placing it on the ground again (even a level 3) takes 7 seconds.
- The speed at which you can move level 3 buildings makes the mini-sentry almost worthless
Simply put, the engineer is now TOO mobile. It should take longer to pack up the sentry, it should take longer to rebuild, or make the engineer more vunerable while moving.
I guess it’s hard to tell at the moment with everyone playing engineer, but I think that’s an issue which should be addresses – even if only for the balance between the two sentries.
09/07/2010 at 12:26 Trollface says:
Saddest thing is that the gunslinger makes it quite impossible. You need more spies or classes that can get behind the mini turrents and destroy them
09/07/2010 at 12:27 TentSalesman says:
Oh god, get ready for 8v8 engineer battles…
09/07/2010 at 14:10 -Spooky- says:
My last srv round got 10 vs 10 eng. *lol* Btw. is their a RPS TF2 srv around? ;)
09/07/2010 at 12:34 gulag says:
The first day was pretty wooly, what with everyone playing Engy. It’s one of my least played classes, and despite being sceptical about the new weapons, I have really enjoyed the way they combo to bring the Texan to the front line. The Wrangler is lots of fun, and the dinky little mini-sentry, combined with the new shot-gun, rewards risky play, instead of leaving the Engy as a back-room supporter.
I’m a little worried that there doesn’t seem to be many counters to mass Engy for either attack or defense right now. Either it will take players a while to figure out new tactics for dealing with a level 3 sentry suddenly appearing on their flanks, or Valve may have to tweak some of the build times/fire rates/etc.
09/07/2010 at 13:12 Aftershock says:
The problem with everything seeming overpowered is that engineers aren’t great against sentry guns.
usually if a sentry gun pops up on the flank, it’ll get some kills and then a bunch of dudes will head over there and kill it.
Problem is, engineers at the moment will head over there and die.
Hightower is great, except when the cart has to go up the ramp in front of the enemy base, it usually turns into two engineers per team building sentry nests to defend that, and the rest deathmatching.
09/07/2010 at 13:07 Frankie The Patrician[PF] says:
Time to install TF2 once again…will nobody think of chi…my hdd space? I need an extra harddrive or something…
09/07/2010 at 13:10 qx says:
Connected to one of my favorite servers today, and lo and behold: 11 engineers on one team.
09/07/2010 at 13:12 VelvetFistIronGlove says:
I’m unfortunately without internet at home at the moment, due to having just moved house. Engineer is my favourite class (and most played), so not being able to take part in the Engineer update is a real wrench.
09/07/2010 at 13:13 Batolemaeus says:
Imho moving buildings is a bit overpowered.
You can almost immediately lock down places and flanks during one uber. On many maps this means medic/heavy go uber, enemy team retreats, I drop a lvl3 sentry to lock down the newly gained space.
Unexpected lvl1 sentries are pretty balanced, but lvl3? Meh.
09/07/2010 at 13:40 AlexW says:
Yeah, I haven’t played much of it so far but I have experienced this, and it’s very frustrating. There doesn’t seem to really be any penalty against building your Level 3 at home and moving it up with the team. I think it should really take as long to move one as it does to head off and build one fresh in a new location, since there isn’t the 530 metal cost of a new one.
09/07/2010 at 20:20 Baf says:
There’s one penalty for doing it that way: the delay. When you drop a level 3 sentry, it has to go through the entire build animation for levels 1, 2, and 3 before it starts shooting anything. If you put it right on the front, it’s going to get destroyed before it deploys fully. (At least, it will if the enemy team has anything other than engineers on it.)
09/07/2010 at 13:33 pimorte says:
I’m surprised RPS hasn’t covered the cheating ‘scandal’ yet.
On the third day of the comp there was an unusual set of winners.
6 or so people from the SourceOP modding team all won the Golden Wrench. This included Drunken_f00l – the guy responsible for both the idling program and several community websites (he was rewarded with a special weapon for the sites).
Obviously people were suspicious, and after investigation by Valve they were all stripped of their wrenches and VAC-banned.
It turns out that the times the wrenches dropped were determined to the second, and someone at Valve leaked the list.
http://www.cyborgmatt.com/sourceop.htm
10/07/2010 at 01:32 DJ Phantoon says:
I still think he’s just covering for everyone else by saying it’s Valve’s fault, which in a way, the entire Golden Wrench fiasco was. They said it was random, they DID NOT say it was “at certain times if you craft you will get one”. I crafted all my stuff away in the very beginning, thinking it was just a solid chance.
As far as I’m concerned, those were the only honest cheats. I’m sure that at least half of that list (y’know, after #20 or so) figured out the times to get one too. I figured they’d also have surprise wrenches, for people who did things like had most wrench kills in one life or something. Nope, just turns out most of us literally never had a chance.
I’m pretty disappointed with this. Sure the new update is fun, but as someone who was already getting six wrench kills in a good run in one life, it’s amazing that they just straight up lied. It’s the sort of thing I would expect from Vivendi-Activision, or EA, or Ubisoft.
09/07/2010 at 13:42 Orange Required says:
I got really excited at the prospect of a 2007-vintage Go! Team article written by Alec.
Then I clicked.
Son, I am disappoint.
09/07/2010 at 13:54 Rakysh says:
Just came off a multiplay server, we got stuck against eight engi’s as an above average team (I thought) on the last point of goldrush, I think. That one is a bastard even when the other team has two or three engi’s, so no surprises we couldn’t make any headway. Ubercharges just got beaten backwards by the wrangler sentries, and there were simply too many engi’s for sappers to last very long Thinking about it though, that map with eight engi’s would have been just as bad pre-update.
We got our revenge on the next map though (CP_Well) when the team with loads of engi’s got steamrolled 6 times in a row (I died once in the whole time).
Basically some maps are now buggered balance wise, but it’s nowhere near as bad as say the scout or sniper/spy update. I am curious what will be next however- TF1890 was suggested on the server.
09/07/2010 at 15:04 Kuroyume says:
I usually play engy when on defense, but when every team has 6-8 of them it’s just no fun… so instead i tried to go demo (one of my least played classes) and i learned that they are really fun, at least when most of the other team is playing engineer…
Also, as a fan of payload, all i can say is the new maps are great… was getting sick of goldrush and badwater
09/07/2010 at 15:13 V. Tchitcherine. says:
This is why I love Valve; the update just screams quality, the new weapons and additions to the Engineer are virtually perfect, the Wrangler is amazingly fun to use and the maps are the most gorgeous TF2 maps I have seen.
Though perhaps I’m biased as I love Payload maps, I was really excited by the prospect of just one… let alone three high-quality maps with wonderful aesthetics and even better gameplay. I can’t wait for the Polycount update… it cannot come soon enough.
Activision would probably charge $US25 for this.
09/07/2010 at 15:28 Rinox says:
Activision would probably charge $US25 for this.
Sad but so true.
09/07/2010 at 15:33 Rinox says:
Not that I doubt any of the stories of teams full of engies here, but don’t most decent servers have some sort of class limit?
09/07/2010 at 15:52 TeeJay says:
Hampshire Heavies usually have a 4 Engie limit (and a generally good attitude), if anyone is looking for somewhere immediately.
09/07/2010 at 20:28 Baf says:
The server I normally play on disabled its class limits for the day just so everyone could play with the new toys.
10/07/2010 at 01:38 DJ Phantoon says:
No, I value freedom of choice too much.
09/07/2010 at 15:40 Brulleks says:
Nope, the best servers let you play as whatever you want whenever you want. This is not a game that benefits from restrictions, or over-seriousness.
09/07/2010 at 15:47 Rinox says:
I dunno. I’d argue that a defending team of 8 engineers isn’t exactly fun for everyone, except for the first few minutes. I’m not saying servers should only have “ideal” class distribution – only so many soldiers, so many scouts etc. – but a decent general cap of the amount of people playing a single class doesn’t seem outrageous to me.
09/07/2010 at 15:51 Arthur Barnhouse says:
But that is a problem that generally solves itself. Sure, sometimes you have the four snipers or six engies, but eventually one side will win, the map will cycle, and new teams are made, and those guys usually get broken up. usually even before that people will switch because you can’t really get a kill with four snipers working. It’s only a problem during times like this, when new equipment is available, but it’ll settle down for after a few days, and it is fun in a weird sort of way to play against 10 engies for a few days.
09/07/2010 at 15:57 TeeJay says:
Some servers have class limits all the time, simply because that is how their players prefer it. There isn’t any “right” or “wrong” – everyone has their own tastes, their own idea of fun.
09/07/2010 at 16:52 blackbaldrik says:
Turret, Trollface, not turrent. Sorry but it just drives me insane when people spell that wrong.
09/07/2010 at 20:05 The Defenestrator says:
Turrent, apply within.
09/07/2010 at 17:22 Ven says:
Finally the engineer is worth playing :p
09/07/2010 at 20:26 Twitchy says:
Back in 07 valve said that once all class updates were released for pc they would put it on consles, that true?
09/07/2010 at 23:48 Thants says:
According to wikipedia it’s been on consoles since 2007.
10/07/2010 at 02:09 Pmeie says:
Maybe twitchy means all the class updates, not tf2 itself.
09/07/2010 at 20:52 Rogue Wisdom says:
I haven’t yet played with this new update, but I think the Wrangler will need some nerfing sometime soon.
2fort sewer platform + Wrangler + lvl2 sentry + 2nd repair engie = impenetrable defences.
10/07/2010 at 00:00 Spectre-7 says:
The new toys are a lot of fun and the new maps offer some interesting new challenges. Breaks my heart that the performance gets worse (for me at least) with every update. Even with every setting turned down and running the DirectX 8.1 renderer, I still chug down to 20 frames per second on some maps. Game used to run at over 100 pretty consistently.
Off to go weep now.
10/07/2010 at 00:37 scottx125 says:
Excelent update if i might add, but the one thing that really annoys me is teh mini sentre, a waste of sapce i think… a spy can mele it without dieing which really says somtink, also why put it with the most coolest had (or wrench) the engineer has, jesus valve what were you thinking!? P.s: its not too late to change it.
10/07/2010 at 01:39 DJ Phantoon says:
Actually if used correctly it can be a devastating gun. One Engineer was giving me a run for my money as a Heavy just by dropping those in hit and run attacks. And if he killed someone else, I was dead.
10/07/2010 at 01:08 Fwiffo says:
Anyone thinking of installing to see the fuss – leave it at least a few days. Gameplay experience is not indicative of normal TF2 right now. It’s sort of sad to see a beleaguered medic trying to hold a ragtag group of heavies and soldiers together against eight achievement hunting engineers.
10/07/2010 at 01:37 DJ Phantoon says:
Really? That was probably the most fun I’ve had! Granted, healing without an ubersaw is a terrible thing.
10/07/2010 at 04:15 Doomer1 says:
I have to admit that now having two flavors of engineer are more fun. First is the traditional defense and supporting engineer using the normal turrets and moving them around to support the team or defend. Then there is the new guy in town the offensive Engineer slapping mini turrets all over the place annoying the enemy, weakening the front runners and making the push forward just a little easier for the team. But the real gem is the wrangler which lets me slam those guys that shoot at me just out of range or hide in a spot the sentry cant detect but you can see. NO MORE WILL THE SNIPERS BE DESTROYING MY SENTRIES!!!
So far its a fun update, will take a few weeks for the teams to balance back to a normal flow. But when it does calm down there will be a whole new game being played. The engineers are not cannon fodder anymore, we got some teeth and it will take us some time to learn how best to bite with it.
10/07/2010 at 15:26 ZeX says:
Finally i been waiting for this update… very nice
12/07/2010 at 01:55 Obdicut says:
@DJ:
Far as I see it, that’s just a different definition of random.