Sticky bomb launcher usage in pubs

[fever 9,884]

I was wondering what people's thoughts were on sticky camping?

The weapon is OP when used in this way in my opinion but it's used in this way in competitive TF2, it's in the TF2Wiki as recommended strategy, and when Intel is dropped you can guarantee people want you to set sticky traps to protect it. IMO placing stickies is the guns primary function and if you don't want to be killed by them then you should use a shotgun to get rid of them or an uber. As with other weapons, I find it funny when people say, you're using that weapon in the wrong way...if it blows shit up I'd argue I'm using it the right way

I'm learning demo, so I'm interested on your thoughts on sticky camping, whichever way you see it.

Edited February 4, 2014 by Fever

[Se7en 10,762]

I think that's called sticky camping and it's pretty low. I can look aside when the players that do it are nubs, but if I saw for example Sexy King doing it I would probably bitch about it.

[D-Bee 3,448]

I've never had a problem with sticky camping unless it's at spawn. Kill the Demo if you don't like his stickies! This is usually not a problem as the Demo will be watching his trap - and not watching his back. Or get a Pyro to blow the stickies in his face.

[fever 9,884]

Thanks, I ask as I invariably play with friends on the other team, and while I want to blow them sky high, I equally don't want to piss them off whilst I'm doing it.

[Wrecking Balls 2,507]

Yes, but he wants to become a good demo and that will not happen by him camping in the base. Sorry Fever but that is just like trying to become a good Soldier by camping the grill in 2fort.

[fever 9,884]

(At the moment) I have been sticking up the opposing base front doors or clearing out the sewers. I've been having a go at sentry guns where possible...which is what I know I should be doing, I'm just not very successful at the moment I'm asking as reading strategy guides and watching 6s matches is all I'm basing demo strategy on at the moment...Sexy ain't around for me spy on and the only other person I know who seems to regularly play demo I think uses scripts, which I don't agree with.

[Chez-Box 3,240]

if demo can get there and sticky camp, sticky camp away

[Sphagnum Peat Moss 748]

That's the purpose of that weapon - camping.  Everything has a purpose and a counter, so counter it.

[D-Bee 3,448]

That's the purpose of that weapon - camping.  Everything has a purpose and a counter, so counter it.

 

I agree 100%. That weapon is area denial all the way. It can be used in other applications, but it's primary purpose is denying control points and hallways. 

[Se7en 10,762]

That's the purpose of that weapon - camping.  Everything has a purpose and a counter, so counter it.

Yeah, that b4anny guy is a massive sticky camper...

[D-Bee 3,448]

All I have to say is that if you have a Spy on your team that's their job - to perform surgical strikes on the other team. A simple, "Hey Spy, go kill that Demo he's being a prick bastard." will usually solve the problem.

[LjubicaZubica 5,610]

Ah too bad Asjo isn´t playing demo, I´m sure he would give you great tips.

Point is you don´t learn anything from sticky camping. You deploy stickies and wait till someone bumps into them and then you click m2. What can you learn from that? 

I don´t say deploying sticky trap is not legit. It is! But siting on one spot for 30 mins and just pressing mouse2 if someone comes, isn´t much of a gameplay.

Can you see in competitive demo just sitting with stickies whole match? I doubt it.

 

We didn´t think anything mean, we were just joking how you became one of them- stick camper. You say you destroyed sentries, cleared sewers and did few moves, I believe you, but if quite few of us noticed you are turning into camper, then you probably are sitting more behind your stickies than actually playing.

 

Anyways, I would recommend you move all the time and try to kill. Sharpen timing and aiming with stickies because they are soooo powerful. If you catch yourself deploying more than 3 stickies or not moving more then 15 seconds.... you are starting camping, move on. 

Before when I used to play medic, I loved to heal demo. Ah Jochi... We would clean whole base with normal uber. He would spam stickies, reloading, popping pipes and if stuck in reloading bottle ftw! Similar as Sexy.

They just don´t sit in one place unless its spawncamping xexe

tl;dr

You have to move from sticky camper to sticky spamer.

Edited February 4, 2014 by LjubicaZubica

[+Dr. Obvious 14,606]

SPAM ALL THE STICKIES!

Crit sticky spam is more of a pest than crocket soldiers, tbh.

[fever 9,884]

This is all great, thanks. More mobile and further forward, sure. Area denial is what I think I should be doing too. I guess I need a sweet spot in the middle...but if my engie is building in the sink room for example, I have to support him.

Also, if I know there are a load of people on the bridge incoming and I don't lay a trap...it's easy to call sticky camper in that situation but what am I supposed to do? Not plant a trap because it's camping? I take onboard the more mobile stuff plus my nade launcher has hundreds more kills that my sticky launcher (my pan is rapidly catching up my sticky launcher)...more mobile and more forward I would prefer though. I'll work on it

TF2Wiki tells you to camp the intel room passageways lol...that's definitely too far into defence

Edited February 4, 2014 by Fever

[Gloves 945]

In my opinion, just have as much fun as possible. 2fort and pubs in general aren't very serious so I usually just stick to the nade launcher and try to hit as many things as possible, as I find that a lot more fun than left click right click, but if your main goal is to win the round or enjoy standing still and waiting for someone to pass through a chokepoint, go for it. =D

[luop90 4,400]

I just never liked that the stickies were absolutely silent. Like at least a rocket makes some sound when flying through the air, and even than its realitively slow. Stickies, if you charge them, and can fly through the air silently and land silently, and stay silent. Sentry guns make a little beeping noise to tell you theyre there. Thats something they should definitely change with the Scottish Resistance. The weapon is made for camping. Making the stickies make some noise when they are on the wall / floor would be useful. Though short circuit now works marvels against it....

[Asjo 90]

I did get a bit worried the other day when I saw you had turned into a sticky camper. You're a good teamplayer and a decent soldier, so it would be quite a loss if you were to turn into one of those players where people shake their head and curse to their teammates.

 

As Ljubica puts it quite well, you need to challenge yourself. You're trying to learn to play sticky demo is a way that no self-respecting skilled demo would play. It's a start, but I'm sure you will learn much faster if you actually run out and challenge the opponents directly. As much as I dislike the sticky bomb launcher in general, I have to admit that it's a lot of fun playing with offensively. I started out being a sticky demo on Dustbowl, so it was one of my first classes. But for a long time I never touched a sticky bomb launcher because it felt unfair to my fellow players. However, recently, I have started joining skial 2Fort (which is a sad camper server anyway) to play offensive sticky demo. Even though I play crazy offensive, never standing still for more than a few seconds, always running forward, I can still quite easily get a similar score to what I get as pyro (which I've played much more). And I think you underestimate just how powerful the sticky bomb launcher is.

 

You say that a bunch of enemies are coming across the bridge. So, what do you do? Place sticky trap for them? Hell no, you spam them to death. You can kill any opponent except heavies with just two stickies and if you fire them the right way, they're really hard to dodge. You can kill a group of opponents within a few seconds this way due to the big area of effect. This weapon is not designed for camping - it's design for annihilation. You need to find out how you spam the stickies correctly and quickly. Therefore your fingers need to learn the muscle memory of quickly aiming upwards every time you shoot. Doing this means that you can shoot the stickies quickly but still get them as far as you need them. Of course, you need to learn to understand the fights you're in and when you need to balance hitting people quickly and directly (by loading the sticky launcher a bit before shooting) and when you can basically spam them to death. Just as importantly, you need to learn how to use the stickies defensively, improving your immediate reaction when an opponent gets too close for the stickies to be effective and practicing your switch to the grenade launcher.

 

Surely, you will say: any sticky demo uses sticky traps. They do, but it's not necessarily to kill, rather to avoid being killed. Despite how crazily overpowered the sticky bomb launched seems, the delay for detonating the sticky bombs that you're very vulnerable when people get close to you. Your greatest weakness, no doubt. A bad demo will negate this weakness by staying back and only making a move once they can clearly identify where the opponents are. A good demo will anticipate the situations where they need to quickly place 2-3 stickies to cover their position if they are shooting at someone. Often, if you're being offensive as a demo and don't place those stickies, someone will jump out right in front of you, and you'll be dead if you aren't very quick to switch to the pipe bombs. This does not mean that you should put these "defensive" stickies all the time. Most of the time you can control space and make sure that people cannot effectively get the jump on you without dying in the attempt. However, imagine a place like sewer stairs on 2Fort. Here, you'll effectively have to cover yourself from three different angles when you go to the top of the stairs, and since you cannot do that, opponents who catch you can kill you easily. The alternative, of course, would be having the grenade launcher ready until you reach the top of the stairs. But when you have such a powerful and flexible weapon as stickies, you don't want to rely on pipe bombs.

[D-Bee 3,448]

Fever, you play on 2Fort a lot. I like that map also. When I play Demo I try to walk into the enemy base, take out the sentry outside their spawn (there should always be one there) and then go down to the Intel and blow up the sentry that's in the Intel room. This is the plan anyway and would work great if I managed to get some help (generally no help, and I have to fight through four or five dudes usually ending in my death). If you play with a decent team and can get someone to follow you and help keep you safe; I recommend this tactic. 

[BloodRedWidow 3,508]

If you want to improve your game, try watching some HL matches Fever. 6's is great and all, but if you want to get better in pubs, HL is more applicable to you. Just my opinion though.

EDIT: Message me if you like some links.

Edited February 4, 2014 by BloodRedWidow

[Sphagnum Peat Moss 748]

I don´t say deploying sticky trap is not legit. It is! But siting on one spot for 30 mins and just pressing mouse2 if someone comes, isn´t much of a gameplay.

Can you see in competitive demo just sitting with stickies whole match? I doubt it.

In competitive matches, there probably aren't hordes of asstards who never learn but instead keep plunging ahead straight into the same trap 10x in a row.  If you want to win, you do what works against the team you're fighting.  If sticky traps work, use them.  If someone gets killed in the same sticky trap twice in a row, they're the one with the problem, not the demoman taking advantage of it.

[LjubicaZubica 5,610]

In competitive matches, there probably aren't hordes of asstards who never learn but instead keep plunging ahead straight into the same trap 10x in a row.  If you want to win, you do what works against the team you're fighting.  If sticky traps work, use them.  If someone gets killed in the same sticky trap twice in a row, they're the one with the problem, not the demoman taking advantage of it.

 

True, true.

I never said sticky trap is taking advantage, use it as you like. I was saying to Fever that he won´t learn much from sticky camping. He won´t learn anything from it but pressing mouse2.

I´m not much into competitive, but I like to watch mach now and then. And I saw demo putting traps on the enemy´s path, but he doesn´t sit on same spot forever, he moves on with his team. If someone gets into trap- great, if not, he moves on with team. You don´t see action all over the map and then demo sitting in one position whole match waiting for someone to bumps into his trap - that´s what I meant.

[-Insanity- 27]

le airbursts.

 

Literally the most awesome thing a good demo utilizes.

 

Being able to shoot stickies in any direction with a super versatile range and letting you blow them up in mid air allows you to choose your AoE depending on yours and the enemy's positioning is so useful i can't even.

 

fuck sticky traps

 

go spam stickies in peoples faces and rip off their facial tissue with epic airbursts.

[Barbaro 466]

 

Eventually though, sticky, or worse, Scottish Resistance, the Demoman is bound to be taken by surprise or simply overpowered as time goes by, you just have to wait for the opportunity for it to come.

 

As for camping with it in general, either you have to have a really terrible team that can't exit fast enough (Or correctly, usually more than one exit), or you got a pro Demo on your hands. It's annoying as hell and does sometimes put you in a spot you don't want to be as normally once they set the bombs on the spawn point, they usually have the launcher fully reloaded and ready to deploy more. Since he's limited to eight, and a maximum of 16 (Which is rare to see a demo shoot that many, after the first eight have been detonated), eventually he will have to reload which while isn't rapid, a second's all you need to lunge at him.

 

Personally, I find camping soldiers more annoying, especially when they rocket jump their way right above the spawn and somehow get krits 99% of the time. Don't even get me started on the Revenge Engi with the minishit pointed somewhere in the corner of your eye and has revenge crits ready.

 

From most to least annoying...

 

1. Camping Heavy w/Medic

2. Camping Soldier

3. Camping Engi

4. Camping Demo

5. Camping Heavy w/o Medic

5. Camping Sniper (REALLY PEOPLE?!)

 

Pick your poison.

Not exactly spawn camping but I thought this was funny, because I would have shit my self if I was on the receiving end.

 

[fever 9,884]

 

Never actually watched this...makes me feel better about my apparent "sticky camping"

Good Vids, cheers for posting.

Edited February 6, 2014 by Fever

[D-Bee 3,448]

Never actually watched this...makes me feel better about my apparent "sticky camping"

Good Vids, cheers for posting.

 

U WUT M8? Fever, watch all the videos immediately!