Sirusblk

I know we've all agreed long ago in the beta that friendly fire isn't a good idea. mainly for the fact that the only way to really check for spys is to shoot at them.

I've always wondered why we don't do something along the lines of shouting "Comm check!" and have everyone press the v key regardless of whether they have a mic or not.

Or alternatively shoot straight into the air. Spys can't show their shooting or reload animations at all.

Don't take this the wrong way, I'm not advocating that we should immediately change and have friendly fire reintroduced. But I do wish to hear your thoughts.

The main problem I see is effectively communicating this to pub players.

But imagine what stradegys we could take with us if we had friendly fire on. Say for 2Fort we have a medic follow a demo man. The demo man shoots a sticky bomb at the floor. The medic and the demo man get on top of it and jump and blast them both to the second level. Circumnavigating lower level lock downs.

2nd story bases could be built by blasting a friendly engineer upstairs.

I know TF2 is a hectic game and that's why I just want to hear your thoughts. I'm not asking for change, so please don't take it as so.

Thanks for your time,

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TheFeniX

Friendly Fire isn't coming back. Valve hard-coded it out of TF2, so it's a non-issue. As I said in my Spy Defense post, most of it's common sense anyways.

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Sirusblk

oops my bad...

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SmokingTarpan

Well, one of the things you suggested I already do. If someone is staring at me that I think is a spy, I tell him, "Start talking." No talk = shots in the face (well, near the face, or around it. okay, more like on the floor, I'm a bad shot). I'll also start talking if I'm around people that are worried so they know I'm not a spy.

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[squadl]
"I am the prettiest african-american, vietnamese..cong..person." -SugarNCamo

Bommando

... which seems infinitely more time consuming and convoluted than just shooting them in the face straight away.

Why discuss methods that actually complicate Spy Checks and clutter comms when we have a tried and tested method already right in front of us?

SmokingTarpan

Heh, you know how many times I've shot someone in the face that I thought was a spy, only to be stabbed in the back by them 2 seconds later? Spies don't die immediately or lose their disguise upon being shot.

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[squadl]
"I am the prettiest african-american, vietnamese..cong..person." -SugarNCamo

Zoopy_T

Shoot them more, or if you are an engineer, wrench them. One wrench hit = inta-kill to a spy in disguise.

SmokingTarpan

So 2-3 seconds (or more) of shooting, or 2-3 seconds of a quick comm check. Both seem equally laborious to me, with the comm check having less room for failure because of my crappy accuracy. :P

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[squadl]
"I am the prettiest african-american, vietnamese..cong..person." -SugarNCamo

Zoopy_T

Problems with comm check:

1. Takes more time
2. Bothers entire team
3. Person you are asking may not have a mic and probably push the 'v' key if you ask him/her to.

icky

Most experienced players are now in the habit of switching weapons and/or shooting when in the company of friendlies, so it is easy to narrow down the possible spies without attempting to kill everyone. I find the difference between playing with a bunch of new players and playing with a bunch of experienced players to be like night and day in this respect.

Unfortunately, if you are playing with inexperienced players, no system aside from shooting or hitting everyone will work.

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Peace through fear... since 1947!

Daxx

This is your problem. And there is no solution beyond shooting/smacking.

Comm awareness works fine in small games (6-8 per side) or organized play. Hell, I'd even go so far to say that the Spy would be almost useless in that style of play due to his low hitpoints.

But on Dustbowl with 12+ people per side? Yeah, not gonna happen, even if all 12 of those people are TG.

Untrue unless you crit. Even then with the variable damage system, your looking at 2-3 hits on average.

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TheFeniX

Actually, we tested this and it's not always true. It's seems about 50/50. And if a medic on your team is healing them (yes, I've seen this a few times), it takes about 3 solid hits one after the other. If you miss once, he's usually back up to full health.

Granted, two wrench hits on a disguised spy not being healed is always a kill from my experience.

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Daxx

Did you test from the front and the back? I've found that I one-wrench a spy more often in the back than if he's facing me.

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I am the one, I am the zero, I am your low resolution hero.

Sirusblk

I don't know... the problem with shooting people, at least in my opinion, it wastes precious ammo, and you might not think it's too bad, but when there's no dispensers around that's a big waste. Demomen are always running out of their ammo for their grenade launcher.

Now granted a hit with an enemy spy will explode on contact where as with a friendly ally it won't, but I've seen that spys that dodge attacks like that are still let by. Every time I go into an enemy base disguised, if I just avoid their initial attack I get let by. Granted it won't work against pyro though.

I'd just rather see us effectively communicate and take down enemy spys and actually have pyros on a more offense position than just spy checks.

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Daxx

Acutually I've found Demo's to be the second best spy detector (pyro number 1)

Drop one sticky, and detonate it. If he goes flying, he's a spy

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I am the one, I am the zero, I am your low resolution hero.