TF2 Guides

[copyboy]

I'm going to compile all sorts of guides on all gameplay subjects for TF2 here.

General:

This is a great site for strategy: http://tf2strategy.com/
and this has a lot of info on specifics: http://tf2wiki.net/wiki/Main_Page


Classes:

How to play Pyro: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGIISxhYRYE
How to play Spy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-qD30EOO-o
How to play Sniper: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ee2LHDFAhRc (this is also great anti-sniper material)
How to play Medic:
1. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bYsahdVegIE
2. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvPeT-1QDPk&eurl=
How to play Heavy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z66iWDH_lgU
How to play Demoman: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ust9AbyZPms&eurl=
How to play Soldier:
1. http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=2FSHDtLIapw (it's Dustbowl, not Well)
2. http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=2egN_JAmS ... re=related (this guy is not that great, but it'll give you basics)
How to play Scout:
1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jRSW0Y1SgoA
2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j59kujK004o
How to play Engineer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZxodkFM8N1U


Maps:

This is a compilation of overhead shots of a variety of maps. It may be more useful for some than others. http://www.mintforce.com/overheads.zip


Team Fortress 2 Team Play:

"Not everyone has played competitively OR in organized games. It's a bit of a different world, and it takes a different set of skills to be successful. I'm going to write here what I've learned to be helpful in an organized game since I've began playing in PUGs.

First, communication. Don't tell your team every single thing. Tell them important events. An important event is a sentry being destroyed, a medic being killed, a particularly annoying sniper going down, etc. These are things that will seriously change how your team mates are currently playing. An important event is not headshotting a heavy. It's not killing a soldier. It's not destroying a teleporter. These are good things, but they usually won't make a huge difference. This also means listening to your team and reacting as is appropriate.

Second, working together. Don't do the things you would do on a pub. If you're a soldier, demoman or a heavy, play with a medic. Have backup. I have never ever seen a single players who could triumph against equal classes in greater numbers. As in, the enemy will be working together. The enemy will have a pyro protecting their heavy, and a medic healing them both. No solitary soldier can take out that group. Don't try. Even if you're a soldier just trying to do something really quick, like get to a good spot for taking out a sentry, don't try it unless your team is there to take the pressure off of you. Unlike in games like CS:S, no one can do a whole hell of a lot by himself. Play with your team. Stick to your medics, and protect your medics.

Third, strategy. Follow it. Any team can come up with a good strategy. A good team will follow the strategy. This means focus. Don't get too distracted by other endeavors that you may or may not be successful in. If the strategy involves you going in as an ubered demo, and destroying the enemy's sentries, do exactly that. If you see a spy, be careful of him, but don't waste your time going after him excessively. If you can't get him right away, just stay the hell away from him and accomplish your goal. Going after a spy, while you'll probably get him, will leave you open to a counter, like a heavy or sniper getting into position to take you both out. If you have a goal, stick to it.

Fourth, class selection. The class you originally choose should obviously work into a greater team strategy, but you should also be conscious of what you're good at, and what you'll be successful with. And if you're not doing well, let your team know, I'm doing terrible at this class, I should change to something else, or switch with someone.

Fifth, think of your team. Obviously, the classes have very specific roles. In my opinion, the heavy is often the backbone of the team. If this is the case for your team, protect the heavy. If it's the sentry, protect the sentry. If you have a vulnerable sniper, and you see a spy about, let him know. And help your team think of you. If a demo's laying stickies on your sentry, or is about to, get someone to help you, whether by killing the demo, or moving the stickies away.

Obviously, I'm not getting into specifics very much. This is a general guide on where your mind should be in organized TF2 games.

I'm not an amazing player, yet I'm almost always effective in some way in every match I play, because I play with my team."




Improving your Aim:

http://www.teamfortress2fort.com/forums ... 9.aspx?p=1

3key from TF2F:

"Improving your aim - Mouse Sensitivity and all a TF2 player needs to know

Have you ever heard the question: "What's your mouse sensitivity?" The idea behind the question is to learn which number will magically improve your aim. What most people don't realize is that whatever answer they get, in most cases it's simply not useful at all. There are way too many variables from computer to computer. On top of things, user preference plays a major factor in the mix. So here it is, a guide to understand about aiming in tf2.


We'll do it in three steps

1) Cleaning
2) Setting your Aim
3) Fine tuning



1) Cleaning - and all the stuff that could be hurting your aim.


1.a) Turn off mouse filtering
Turn off enhanced "pointer precision" in your windows mouse properties.



1.b) Advanced residual XP crap cleaning
Warning: If you don't know anything about modifying the registry in XP SKIP THIS STEP.
It seems that even without pointer precision disabled, the mouse under XP is still influenced by an acceleration curve. This is especially noticeable in games. To completely remove mouse acceleration from XP, you will need to go into the registry and adjust the SmoothmouseXYCurve values. However, this means modifying the registry.

I know how to modify the registry, show me what's needed to be changed?: http://www.tweakxp.com/article36785.aspx



1.c) Launch Options commands
Insert the following under "Set Launch Options" (In steam, right click on your tf2 icon, then click on properties, then click on Set Launch Options)
-noforcemaccel -noforcemparms -noforcemspd

I want to know more about this subject




2) Setting your aim.


2.a) Update your Firmware.
(This is not completely necessary, but sometimes, this is the answer to some problems.)


2.b) Turn off acceleration in your mouse driver settings or in windows.
In theory, enabling acceleration is convenient for quickly moving the mouse cursor large distances on your screen. However, you will have a hard time being more precise. For all intents and purposes, it's better if you leave this off.

2.c) Set your Mouse to 800 DPI
800 DPI is probably the best setting for most gaming purposes.
(If you don't have a gaming mouse, ignore 2.c)
Ok, this one is tricky to explain. First, let's debunk the most popular myth and the biggest gimmick perpetrated on gamers since the beginning of the history of gaming mice.
Higher DPI does not equal higher presicion.
First of all the term DPI is wrong as well, as mice uses Counts Per Inch or CPI. CPI is the resolution of your mouse sensor, or how many "counts" can the mouse detect when you move 1 inch. But just for the sake of simplicity and less confusion, let's call it DPI. Now, let's take a mouse with one of the highest dpi settings in the market. The Razer Lachesis and its impressive 4000 DPI. Also, for this test let's assume we have a 24'' wide screen monitor with a resolution of 1920x1200. In order to test this more accurately, we would also have to have a configuration of this mouse of 1:1 (or in other words max sensitivity). Now, if we set this mouse to 4000 DPI and we move it only 1 inch, what do you think the results will be? The pointer will fly through the screen almost twice in width in under an inch of movement. Since the mouse becomes unmanageable you have to modify either the DPI or the sensitivity. Let's say you move the slider for sensitivity to the exact middle, that will turn the sensitivity multiplier to 0.5 and thus successfully downgrading your 4000 DPI mouse into a 2000 DPI one. This is why high DPI mouse statements are gimmicky and ridiculous, yet, they help sell more expensive mice.
So... why everybody says higher DPI will make me more accurate? the answer is simple, it's marketing B.S.
I'm still not convinced, I want to learn more about this

2.d) Set to a comfortable sensitivity on windows XP. You can place an shortcut/icon on one corner of your desktop and place your cursor on the opposite corner. Now try to click on it consistently in one swift move. It doesn't have to be completely accurate, but do this until it feels just right.

2.e) Polling Rate
The polling rate determines how many times per second a sample of movement is registered to the screen. Increasing the mouse polling rate will give a more accurate reading on the mouse's position.
I still don't get it, I wanna read more about it.
You might want this to be at 500 mhz. Some gaming mice are capable of 1000 mhz but there are still some people reporting problems associated with high polling rate. Believe me, 500mhz is good enough.
How do I know what's the polling rate of my mouse?
How to make the polling rate higher - please read the readme.txt file first. It's very important that you follow the instructions.




3) Fine Tuning


TF2 default commands
This commands will set most settings to default, so we can start from scratch. You need to add them to your autoexec.cfg and remove them from the individual config classes if necessary.

m_customaccel_exponent "0" // Mouse move is raised to this power before being scaled by scale factor.
m_customaccel_max "0" // Max mouse move scale factor, 0 for no limit
m_customaccel_scale "0" // Custom mouse acceleration value.
m_filter "0" // Mouse filtering smooths input averaged over last two frames. In other words, it smooths mouse movement at the cost of accuracy.
m_forward "1" // Mouse forward factor.
m_mouseaccel1 "0" // Windows mouse acceleration initial threshold (2x movement).
m_mouseaccel2 "0" // Windows mouse acceleration secondary threshold (4x movement).
m_mousespeed "1" // Windows mouse speed factor (range 1 to 20).
m_pitch "0.022000" // Mouse pitch factor.
m_side "0.8" // Mouse side factor.
m_yaw "0.022" // Mouse yaw factor.
m_customaccel "0" // Custom mouse acceleration


TF2 Mouse Sensitivity
The command to modify mouse sensitivity in TF2 is

sensitivity "5"

for example my mouse sensitivity is: sensitivity "2.8" - which works well for me. But, how do you exactly know what's a good mouse sensitivity for you? It takes time to find it, but this is what you do:

1) In game, find a spot on a wall that you want to hit with a shotgun or rockets
2) Place yourself right in the front of this spot at a reasonable distance and turn 180 degrees to face the complete opposite direction to this spot
3) Place your mouse in the very middle of your mousepad
4) In a swift move to the right (or left), make a 180 degree turn and fire.
5) If you hit the spot consistently, you have found a perfect mouse sensitivity


Mouse Sensitivity for all the Classes
I would not recommend use different settings for different classes. It takes quite a while to perfect movements and land hits exactly where you want them. Making different sensitivities for different classes will make this process longer. I don't recommend it at all.


Scout
Some scouts have told me that they turn down the sensitivity to use this class. I personally haven't tried this myself, but if i did i would try it with a subtle difference. For example, if my sensitivity was set to "5", then I would lower it just a bit to "4.8"

Soldier
This is one of the few classes where I break my own rule. I have added the following to soldier.cfg:
m_pitch "0.0227"
Remember that if you do this you have to add the default value to all the other classes. What this command does, is increases a tiny bit the up/down sensitivity of the mouse in favor of easier rocket jumping.

Pyro
I haven't found any reason to modify the mouse sensitivity for this class.

Demoman
I haven't found any reason to modify the mouse sensitivity for this class.

Heavy
I haven't found any reason to modify the mouse sensitivity for this class but if I did, I would increase the speed for left and right just a bit (which means, that the default value needs to be added to all the other classes). This would be what i use:
m_yaw "0.0227"
The reason to modify this is because as a heavy you need to be rotating constantly left to right, you need to do it fast and you're not needed to have a pinpoint accuracy.

Engineer
I haven't found any reason to modify the mouse sensitivity for this class.

Medic
I haven't found any reason to modify the mouse sensitivity for this class.

Sniper
The sniper has a cool command that affects the sensitivity while zoomed in. This is another that you need to find what feels just right for you. I don't have a method for this except trial and error. The command is:
zoom_sensitivity_ratio "0.75"
It takes a while to find your perfect sensitivity but it's needed. There's more to have pinpoint accuracy though. As a sniper you need to know exactly where to aim, because of the hitboxes and netcode. Also, if you don't have smooth and stable fps you'll have a hard time sniping regardless of how good everything else is. But smooth fps and netcode correction are subjects too big on their own to be covered in this post.

Spy
I haven't found any reason to modify the mouse sensitivity for this class.





Other factors that can improve or reduce your ability to aim correctly:
Mousepads and Mousefeet
This is another overlooked aspect of serious gamers. Buying a gaming mouse without a proper mousepad is like buying a racing car with bad tires. There are way too many types of mousepads with different sizes, shapes, and prices. If you're interested in buying a new mousepad you really need to do your homework and read reviews before you do and watch out where you get information from.
Also make sure you have enough teflon on your mouse feet.

Weight
Some people like more weight on their mouse, some people don't. People who use high sensitivity like to have more weight while people with low sensitivity would feel more comfortable with less weight. I personally don't like weight on my mice. I owned several of the logitech MX series and everytime i got a new mouse i would have to open the mouse and unscrew the added weight. Nowadays, with newer gaming mice you don't have to deal with any of that anymore as you can add the weight yourself... or not.



We'll, this is it, I hope this guide can help some people. Also, I'm sure some people in these forums know other things that can be added to it. I hope you had fun reading it as I had writing it. Happy - more accurate - fragging!"

[Sukwendo]

Tons of good material here to peruse! Now maybe I won't be such an annoyance.

[Scism3]

Tons of good material here to peruse! Now maybe I won't be such an annoyance.

You were not that bad!!

[lol]

WALLOFTEXT.