Eion's guide to deception and cold blooded death.

Eion · Sat Dec 08, 2007 1:01 am

I thought I'd share some of the things I do as a Spy and what usually makes you hate me.

Yes, this is quite similar to the video that was posted but I've written this because I wanted to, so don't bother pointing that out to me, please.

1) Overview of the Spy:

To me the Spy is there for the following reasons:

- Solving problems other classes might have a harder time solving themselves.
This basically involves the following.

- Quickly dispatching Medic/PyroHeavyDemoSoldier squads.
This is a great help to the rest of the team, if you're able to take out a Medic and his buddy you have a big chance of turning the tide of the battle, since you pretty much open up a path to your teammates. This is most useful on servers with a longer respawn timer as it hurts alot more to get backstabbed then than it would on an instant respawn server. This is top priority if you're a defender.

- Taking care of Engineers and their buildings.
Most of the times, be it attacking or defending there's always sentries to take out anyone who crosses it's path. The sentry is the scout's bane and will have a really hard time getting past them if he's trying to get to the intel. Spies can easily dispatch of the sentries themselves and then take the engineer out, or they can just keep it sapped while your friends enter and help take it down while it's disabled and useless. This is top priority if you're an attacker.

- Scouting ahead.
Spies excel at scouting the maps undetected, and they have the easiest time letting the rest of the team know what's coming towards them and from where. Helps alot if you catch an enemy spy disguising on the way.

2) The usefulness of disguises.

UPDATE!
As of the Goldrush Patch, you can now use teleporters in disguise without getting the glowing trail under your feet! You can also capture points in friendly disguises!

The disguise is a wonderful thing. No doubt you all know what it does so I won't explain it.

I'll be bringing up the points of every disguise there is, and the pros and cons of it.

1. The Scout

Pros: Not many. Except that you look like a scout.
Cons: Drastic speed reduction. Whenever I see a Scout running slower than usual I immidieately shoot him down. Spies don't gain the speed bonus which makes the Scout a poor choice of disguise.
When to use: Never.

2. The Soldier

Pros: You often get healed by a Medic who doesn't second guess you.
Cons: Slight speed reduction. The reduction might not be big, but it's definately crippling if you're looking to chase others down for a backstab.
When to use: When your health is running low and you've found an unsuspecting enemy medic.

3. The Pyro

Pros: Same runspeed as a Spy, usually get healed. Great disguise.
Cons: None as far as I can think of. Unless you run into a trigger happy Pyro who's name you happened to steal.
When to use: I often use this disguise when blending in with the medics and assault classes, they rarely second guess my disguise because I look like I'm trying to get in on the action.

4. The Demoman

Pros: Get healed and don't get second guessed alot.
Cons: Runspeed reduction.
When to use: Same as Pyro really. I avoid this disguise.

5. The Heavy

Pros: Who'd second guess a Heavy for a Spy? Reasons are in Cons.
Cons: It's like making a turtle chase the duracell rabbit. This is probably THE worst disguise ever. You're slow, vulnerable and fat.
Where to use: Team Fortress 2 roleplay cyber sex.

6. The Engineer

Pros: Same runspeed as a Spy. Also great for sapping when there's 2+ engineers around with 2+ turrets. They might just start hitting eachother instead of you.
Cons: Can't be used in friendly territory, because they'd second guess you since your job is at home. Like a wife. I kid, I kid.
Where to use: Enemy base, preferably away from other engineers unless you want to sap them or take them out because Engineer's are very sketchy when guarding their turrets. They'll shoot anyone.

7. The Medic

Pros: Same runspeed as a Spy.
Cons: No Ubercharge bar when enemies target you. You are unable to heal which might lead to second guessing you.
Where to use: Near assault units. (Demo, Heavy, Pyro, Soldier.)

8. The Sniper

Pros: Same runspeed as a warrior. Very enemy base friendly.
Cons: You can't walk slowly like Snipers do when they've got their scope up and you won't have the rifle by your eye.
Where to use: I always put this on when I sneak into the back of the enemy base. You can act like you're just keeping to yourself sniping anyone that enters. Then switch to Engineer or Pyro and run toward the group.

9. The Spy

Pros: You switch colors?
Cons: Whether you're a friendly spy or an enemy spy, you'll always get shot at for looking like a spy. Do not use this disguise.
Where to use: Never.

So in short, this is my top list of disguises, going from highest rated to lowest:

1. Engineer
2. Sniper
3. Pyro
4. Demoman
5. Soldier
6. Medic
7. Scout
8. Spy
9. Heavy.

3) The Cloak.

Aah, the cherry on the ice cream. The cloak offers complete invisibility for a semi-short amount of time and it allows for bypassing of enemy players. I'll just jot down what to do and not to do with the cloak.

Do:
Cloak before an enemy sees you.
Take the least used routes.
Make sure you have enough time on your cloak to get past.
Uncloak in safe spots to recharge your timer and to make sure no one saw you uncloak.

Don't:
Bump into enemy players, this will make you flicker and you will be exposed until you get away from the enemy.
Take damage. This will also make you flicker.
Uncloak around enemy players. This is a dead giveaway.
Uncloak right behind an enemy.

4) The weapons and the Sapper.

The Knife
This beautiful switchblade is what makes you feared. One strike to the back will make the hardiest opponent drop dead instantly. It's fairly weak otherwise, it takes around 4 stabs from the front to kill a Sniper with full health. Learn the blade. Live the blade. Be the blade. Kill sh*t.

The Revolver

A fairly underestimated weapon, this baby can actually be very useful to a Spy. It does around 20-70 damage depending on range, and a critical hit will do about 120 damage. Which is almost an instant kill to any weak unit.

There have been many times where I'm right behind a unit that's as fast as I am and I just haven't been able to reach him. That's where this baby comes in handy. It's also very good for picking opponents that try to melee you incase you miss a backstab and you leave yourself exposed. Use it alot, even if your knife is the primary source of your damage.

The Electro Sapper

This pretty little tool is what Engineers hate the most. You can instantly place it on an Engineer's building to disable it, and make it's health slowly tick away. Engineers can ofcourse get rid of it by whacking it with their wrench but that's where you come in and swiftly take his life. Placing a sapper will not cost you your disguise, which adds to the utility of it. You have an unlimited amount and it places instantly so you don't need to stand still. Go nuts with it if there's lots of buildings. And remember to wear your hardhat.

5) Infiltration

I won't share with you my own tactics of slipping into the crowd unnoticed, an artist has to keep some to himself, but I can break it down for you.

- Don't go into tight passages if unavoidable. Chances are you'll bump into an enemy. No, you can't jump over them as far as I know.

- Time your cloak well.

- Try not to stick out too much.

- Use the least watched over passage way, for example the tunnel between A and B in Gravelpit.

- Utilize what you have! Don't randomly stab at a person if you miss the first time and they detect you, retreat while shooting the person down then cloak to a safe spot and repeat.

- Stick to the places where people stand still alot, for example sniper spots or where Medics hide behind walls to heal Heavys in a doorway.

6) What's your tactic? Be a better team player!

I've wanted to write this section for quite some time, but I really never got around to it.

During my countless hours in Team Fortress 2 as a Spy, I've noticed distinct differences in certain spies we have on our server. I've done some thinking and narrowed it down to two types of spies you have ingame.

First off, the Solo Spy:

The Solo Spy is the type of Spy that is not a team player.
The Solo Spy often thinks of himself and what he can do to boost his points. He keeps only points and killing the easiest victims in mind. The Solo Spy keeps very little communication with his team and does his own thing. You'd normally find this spy around the snipers and heavies, killing them then leaving to make sure they can survive long enough to break that backstab record.

We also have the Team Spy:

The Team Spy is obviously a team player.
This spy will keep very vital communication with his team, waiting to be told where he's needed the most, and follows those orders be it taking out an engineers and his base, getting rid of pesky enemies, or even on rare occasions be told to lure the enemy medics out into our crowd, which is really effective if done right. I was once chain healed by 3 medics as a heavy and I led them right into our 2 sentries resulting in their death. The Team Spy doesn't care much about points than he does about actually winning.

Personally, I consider myself a team spy, I like feeling like part of the team and doing what I can to support my fellow members. It's why they us in the Support category.

7) Maps

I'm going to be slowly adding some overview map screenshots that I clumsily draw on to give you the basic idea of how I move around the maps.

Dustbowl

This is one part of Dustbowl and it's one of my personal favorites so I'll do this one first. The blue dots represent where I usually make me kills when I'm attacking and the red dots are for when I'm defending. Sentries are marked in orange and those are the typical spots to place them.

If there's anything you'd like to point out or comment on feel free to do so. This is my first guide ever on anything so pointers would be great! Keep in mind that this is how I play, if you can find your own individual playstyle that you find works alot better for you, then you should definately stick to that and maybe teach me a thing or two. I haven't really mastered the class yet, I still get caught alot and often die within 2 minutes. But I'm getting there.

Thanks for being patient with the reading, there's probably some typos in there but I can't be assed to spellcheck! xD

Eion's guide to deception and cold blooded death.

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