User:Tallahzirakzigal

Hi, hello, hi. Yes, most of this page is merely suggestions. However, they also act as a sandbox for wiki formatting, so I can do two things at the same time.

Engineer Suggestions

The potential for the Engineer is massive. Here's a few little ideas:

Recharger (Replaces Shotgun)

•  Works somewhat like a Medigun

•  Provides ammo to "healed" teammates, rather than the Medigun's healing
•  Drains metal constantly in use
•  Cannot be used with no metal
•  Does not restore metal to friendly engineers
•  Can restore ammo to enemy disguised Spies

•  Accumulate "Megabuild" as you "heal", working like an Ubercharge
  •  During Megabuild, +50% build rate
  •  Works when activated even when not holding the Recharger
  •  -50% Megabuild rate when "healing" someone with full ammo

Do something handy while joining a push. Provide ammo to the team. Then, when corpses line the floor, collect up some metal and secure the area!

Recharger alternative (Replaces Wrench)

"Protect itty-bitty gun-building man!"

•  On haul item: Drains metal constantly to provide ammo for teammates and enemy disguised Spies
  •  On no metal remaining, ALL of this item's advantages are lost until more metal is collected
•  +25% hauling speed
•  +50% redeploy building rate
•  -25% inital build rate (not on wrenching, unlike the Jag)

If you don't bother with hauling, this is a straight downside. However, if you do, you can assist a push and secure ground fast. If you're in a team, this is tremendously effective to keep the ammo lines going and secure ground. If you're solo, this will steal your metal and give nothing much.

Railgun (Replaces Pistol)

•  Can repair and upgrade friendly buildings
•  Actual repair/upgrade starts at 2/5 of normal Wrench repair/upgrade rate, and drops down the further away you are
•  Per shot: -10 metal
•  -20% fire rate

An old weapon in a different format. The Railgun offers longer-range repairs, handy if your sentry gun is hard to reach. However, it's more expensive in metal costs, and quickly depletes stocks.

Tele-friend (Replaces PDA)

•  Allows a second Teleporter entrance to be built
•  If a Spy saps an entrance, it won't affect the other one
•  If a Spy saps the exit, it will affect both entrances
•  Hitting any point with a wrench will repair and upgrade all three parts
•  If one entrance is destroyed, the teleporter will retain its upgrade. If any two pieces are destroyed, all upgrades will be lost.
•  Teleporters need +50 metal to upgrade

A team-coloured wrench with an odd liquid inside.

The tele-friend is especially effective if you're the only Engineer on the team and there's two spawns, (so you can cover both of them,) or if your team controls a fairly central region (you could place a teleport entrance secretly in their base and safely in yours, meaning your team has an escape route.) Unfortunately, higher amount of metal required (and the fact a Spy sapping the exit will destroy everything) means you need to establish a base before you can really start using the teleporter effectively.

Metalworking Hammer (Replaces Wrench)

•  +50% Repair rate
•  +25 Metal on upgrading an item
•  -25% Fire speed (Impacts both damage and upgrade speed)

Metalworking Hammers make upgrading and defence slower, but compensate you with metal on an upgrade, making it easier to get your next level, and also meaning you don't need to venture out as much for metal. Repairing is slightly faster, but not massively faster.

Tank Plans (Replaces PDA)

•  Replaces Sentry with Tank Gun or with Gunslinger, Tank Mini-Sentry
  •  +50% health
  •  +70 initial metal cost
  •  -20% fire rate
  •  -20% turn speed

With more health, the Tank Gun can stand up to all sorts of threats, including Spies. High metal costs, however, makes it longer to get ready, and a slow turn speed encourages defensive usage.

Bunker Builder (Replaces PDA)

•  Replaces Dispenser with Armoured Fridge
  •  +100% health
  •  Costs 125 metal to build
  •  -50% ammo and metal given

The Armoured Fridge acts as a back-up in case everything else is destroyed. Many go straight for the Sentry and ignore anything else, but even if your Sentry's gone, you can still save this. A higher cost, however, means after setting this up, you'll have to wait longer to build a Sentry, or vice versa, and less metal given makes it harder to set up.

Heal Booth Generator (Replaces PDA)

•  Replaces Dispenser with Heal Booth
  •  Only requires 75 Metal to build
  •  -25% build time
  •  +50% range
  •  +25% heal rate
  •  -25% health compared to Dispenser
  •  No ammo or metal given

This is intended for more Team-based usage. A cheap cost means you can set this up anywhere, and fast building means it'll be healing up allies quickly. No ammo means you'll have to venture out more as an Engineer.

The Explosive Response (Replaces PDA)

•  Adds charges on buildings you build.
  •  If the buildings are destroyed, they blow up, harming enemies, based on type of building and level.
  •  This doesn't apply to sapped buildings
•  +15 metal upgrade cost

Humiliated by Scouts whacking your teleporter exit to death with a fish? Tired with enemies just sweeping up your buildings when the Sentry's down? How about they explode in their faces? Killed by a dispenser... Now that's gotta be humiliating.

Meddling Mechanic

A weapon set for the Engineer, focusing on metal usage and strong offensive-push bases, at a personal cost.

The Millwright's Mechanism (Replaces Shotgun)

•  With at least 200 metal, taunt to reload using 100 metal.
•  Damage scales inversely with metal. Optimum damage is 100 metal below the cap.
  •  -100 metal from cap = +15% damage
  •  Metal cap = -25% damage

The Mechanism is a clockwork shotgun, and is great for Engineers in a tight spot. If you lack metal, you can fire for a slight damage bonus, making it ideal for offensive teleporter placement or the like. Too full of metal? You can taunt to reload with it. "-100 metal from cap" means 100 metal if without the Sentry's Snackbox (see below), or 150 with it. This makes the Snackbox an effective grouping for it.

Sentry's Snackbox (Replaces Pistol)

"Never leave spawn without it"

•  +50 metal cap

The Sentry's Snackbox lets both a dispenser and a sentry gun to be placed without needing a top-up. Your buildings will also be able to survive longer - you can repair them more from one inventory of metal.

Spanner (Replaces Wrench)

"A lil ol' somethin' from over the pond"

•  Uses 40 metal at a time, rather than 25 for upgrading
•  -15 max health on wearer

The Spanner is very good for setting up quickly, but leaves you even more vunerable than normal. With the Sentry's Snackbox, the higher metal usage couples with the higher metal cap to give around the same window of time for ammo-trips.

The Petroleum Baron

"Got Oil?"

Another weapon set, focusing on getting rid of single players and repairing afterwards.

Old Sparky (Replaces Shotgun)

•  On Alt-fire: Stun very close enemies, for an entire ammo clip
•  +15% switch speed
•  -33% clip size
•  -10% damage

Old Sparky is an old attempt to make an electric shotgun. Why weren't more made? Because its inventor shot anyone who tried to steal the blueprints.

Old Sparky is great for getting out of Sapper-lock. Stun the spy, remove the sapper, or just stun and kill. However, it's a little weaker as a main weapon which is fairly problematic.

The Clipmaster (Replaces Pistol)

•  +2.5% damage for every hit in a row, without missing, on the same opponent (Up to +30%)
  •  This resets on reload, or after 2 seconds of not firing
•  -10% base damage
•  +50% time to reload

Build up your one-on-one attacks with the Clipmaster. Ineffective if your enemy keeps going for cover.

Turnscrew (Replaces Wrench)

•   Can "Overbuild" buildings to 25% over max health
  •   Cannot "Overbuild" buildings currently under attack
  •   "Overbuild" decays over time
•  -25% damage
•  -10% repair rate

Prepare against explosive attacks with the Turnscrew! Hastily switch to some other weapon after! (Disclaimer: Does not help weapon switch speed. Weak against co-ordinated attacks.)

Drill Blueprints (Replaces PDA)

•  Allows a Oil Drill to be made for 150 metal
  •  When oil coats a player, they will suffer minicrits from fire damage, and the afterburn duration will be constantly extended until the oil's off.
  •  If a friendly Pyro ignites it, it will give out fire for 10 seconds, igniting anything that gets near. If it kills a player, the Pyro will get a kill assist.
  •  Level 2 drills have a larger radius, and level 3 drills revolve faster
•  -10% movement speed on wearer

The Drill helps to protect against the threat of Spies, but will weigh you down considerably. This makes forward attacks difficult.

Graduation Party

"Make that twelve hard science PHDs!"

University-themed items, bringing more strength to the Engineer at the cost of less construction ability.

The Fourth Amendment (Replaces Pistol)

•  +66% Clip size
•  +15% Weapon switch time
•  Uses metal as ammo, 1 metal per shot

A plastic-handled gun manufactured for "domestic" use.

This can load up to 20 bullets at a time, capitilising on a massive ammo pool and being great at chasing fleeing players. Unfortunately, a slow weapon switch means that you may not have time to switch back to the melee weapon to repair your Sentry gun.

Commercial Agenda (Replaces PDA)

•  Replaces Dispenser with Vending machine:

•  Charges up a mini-crit meter. When it's full, it grants mini-crits to friendly players in range, reducing the meter. The meter will only go down if players are nearby.
•  Builds 20% faster
•  +20% range
•  Mini-crit meter charges up faster as the Vending Machine is upgraded
•  No ammo/metal given

The Vending Machine is more intended for team use than personal use, and is more for offensive than defensive use. As dispensers don't have a particulary long range, players need to stay close. Slow classes, like the Soldier or the Heavy excel here.

The Mortarboard

Like all set headgear, requires 4 Refined Metal and 1 Set Weapon

A hat similar to worn by graduates, with an yellow/orange trim (depending on team).

Campus Scarf

Like all set misc items, requires 4 Refined Metal and 1 Set Weapon

A scarf resembling a deep, team-colour trim of a academic robe.

The Railman

A support-based set focusing on team mobilisation and speed advantages.

Six-Flag Firearm (Replaces Shotgun)

"Some folks keep movin' around. But some have t' stay and maitain them very things that keep 'em movin. So does that make 'em weak? Nah, they just use a bigger, heavier gun. When you ain't movin' much, you don't need ta."

•  +25% damage
•  +15% weapon switch speed
•  -70% clip size
•  While equipted: -10% movement speed

The Six-Flag Firearm is either as a finishing weapon (to pair with the Overtaker) or for when you're cornered. Slower movement speed makes it less pratical as a main weapon, so it makes it fairly weak with the Short Circuit or Wrangler.

The Overtaker (Replaces Pistol)

•  Slows on hit
•  +50% clip size
•  -50% damage
•  -150 max ammo

This pairs particularly well with the Departer and Six-Flag Firearm - the speed advantage of the dispenser to chase down foes, followed by a burst of the Firearm. The lower max ammo means you're more likely to need to stay at your dispenser.

Prising Rod (Replaces Wrench)

"In the words of our CEO: A fine piece of TELEPORTER-POUNDING-ACTION so even if you're not SMASHING IN HEADS at the front lines, you can POUND IN METALLIC STYLE."

•  On hit of Teleporter: +10% charge
•  Teleporter: +25% health for level 3
•  Teleporter: -25% health for level 1
•  -20% base Construction rate (not wrenching, unlike the Jag)

The Prising Rod diverts attention towards the Teleporter and, providing you're maitaining it, you can greatly improve the rate of incoming players. Lower base Construction rate makes wrenching more desirable, and again, this keeps you near your buildings.

The Departer (Replaces PDA)

•  Dispenser: Gives a temporary speed-boost effect to nearby teammates (Similar to Disciplinary Action)
  •  Effect also given to disguised enemy spies
•  Dispenser: -25% heal rate

Woo! I could split the Pistol and Dispenser ideas! The dispenser changes are designed around quick use, and as such works better in positions where people are likely to pass by. Placing it next to your teleporter exit is a good idea.

Pyro Suggestions

Vacuum Cleaner (Replaces Flamethrower)

•  +25% airblast range
•  +10% damage
•  Airblasts work in reverse, taking in opponents rather than knocking them back
•  Airblasts have no effect on projectiles
•  -50% afterburn duration

The Pyro has a knack for modifying everyday items, and this is no exception.

Vacuum Cleaners encourage more aggressive techniques, pulling in pesky opponents and finishing them. However, you lose a support option - you can't get rid of sticky carpets.

Madman's Masher (Replaces Shotgun)

•  +50% more accurate
•  Uses 10 flamethrower fuel per shot in addition to ammo costs
•  -50% close-range ramp-up

For mid-range, this shotgun works effectively, helping to cover a weakness of the Pyro. However, reliance on flamethrower fuel means you'll eliminate your best close-range option quickly.

Mannthrower Kit

"Sure, throwing flames is fun. But nothing beats throwing men!"

Set bonus:

•  -50% knockback recieved

Airblaster (Replaces Flamethrower)

Possible Crafting recipe: Degreaser + Force-A-Nature + Reclaimed Metal

•  -20% airblast cost
•  Hold down alt-fire to charge an airblast. The longer it's charged for, the greater pushing force it'll have, knocking back players and reflecting projectiles in a larger area. Like charging a Stickybomb launcher, holding for too long will release the airblast, ready or not.
•  -10% damage
•  -10% weapon switch

The Airblaster offers more utility in airblasting. Charged airblasts are much easier to execute and are brilliant for long-range shots.

The Intensifier (Replaces Shotgun)

Possible Crafting recipe: Reserve Shooter + Force-A-Nature + Reclaimed Metal

•  Knockback on enemies already in the air by compression blasts
•  -15% damage

The Intensifier really makes a knockback more effective. It enables you to juggle players briefly - which may be enough to kill them.

Air Extractor (Replaces Fire Axe)

Possible Crafting recipe: Powerjack + Short Circuit + Reclaimed Metal

•  +30% ammo from ammo packs and dropped weapons (except Engineer wrenches)
•  -50% fire speed

The Air Extractor is a oddly modified air pump. It's unknown what the Pyro did to it.

This compliments the airblasting abilities effectively, by making up the high amount of ammo used.

Medic Suggestions

Just a few random suggestions for the Medic, as an important yet unpopular class needs more reasons to play it.

Primary

Weapon	Ammo Loaded	Ammo Carried	Damage Range	Notes / Special Abilities
Salzwunde	40	150	Base: 10 Crit: 30 [10 syringes / sec.]	Mini-crits bleeding opponents.  +50% bleed damage vunerability on wearer.
Last Aid	20	150	Base: 10 Crit: 30 [10 syringes / sec.]	Grants a clip of critting needles for every Ubercharge fully deployed.  Ubercharges deployed and completed in spawn areas will not contribute.  -50% clip size.

Secondary

Weapon	Ammo Loaded	Ammo Carried	Damage Range	Notes / Special Abilities
Phase	N/A	N/A	N/A	ÜberCharge effect: Invisibility Medic and healing beam become invisible. 2x heal rate on target and Medic. Can heal cloaked friendly Spies.  +25% ÜberCharge duration.
Energisch	N/A	N/A	N/A	ÜberCharge effect: Energise Mini-crit boost. +40% movement speed. Medic can match the speed of the patient.  Has +25% faster charge rate.
Fireman's Grace	N/A	N/A	N/A	Heals in an arc rather than a beam, the arc being much like a syringe gun Healing drop-off over range   ÜberCharge effect: Cleansing Jet Firing arc is much straighter. No healing drop-off. Knocks back enemies. Rapidly cleanses negative status effects on allies.   +15% heal rate.   Has +25% faster charge rate.
The Hose of Industry	N/A	N/A	N/A	ÜberCharge effect: Ammo Frenzy Infinite ammo and metal to Über target during charge's effect Reloading is 60% faster for patient +25% heal rate for you and your patient   +20% ÜberCharge rate   Healing restores friendly player's ammo at 50% of the level 1 dispenser's rate   ÜberCharges can only be on one person per charge.   -10% heal rate

	Associated item	Description
	Energisch [[Energisch|Template:Dictionary/items/energisch]]	The Medic focuses the Energisch in front of him and turns up the voltage. An enemy player caught in it is killed, and nearby friendly players gain health if an enemy player is killed.

Melee

Weapon	Ammo Loaded	Ammo Carried	Damage Range	Notes / Special Abilities
Scapel	N/A	N/A	Base: 13 Crit: 39	On hit: Causes bleed for 10 seconds.  -80% damage penalty.  Intended to go with the Salzwunde Syringe Gun
Jaw of Life	N/A	N/A	Base: 65 / 32 Crit: 195 / 96	Has 37% longer melee range.  25% faster weapon switch speed.  –50% decrease in damage when health is more than 50% of max.
The Incapacisaw	N/A	N/A	Base: 65 / 0 Crit: 195 / 0	Stuns opponents for 2 seconds on second hit in a row.  Does no damage on a stun hit  -25% swing speed  5 second delay between a stun from this weapon and someone being able to be stunned again
Bone Bucket	N/A	N/A	Base: 65 / 0 Crit: 195 / 0	On hit: +15 health for nearby friendly players.  Charges up an "Overuse" bar every hit, which lowers damage and health restored.  Fully charging "Overuse" will stun you for 2 seconds

Sniper Suggestions

The Snipe Catcher (Replaces Sniper Rifle)

"I'll guarentee you won't go hungry..."

•  On headshot: Damage done is distributed as health restoration to nearby allies (in a certain radius)
•  -25% damage

A non-sawn-off shotgun with a scope attached.

The Snipe Catcher offers support utility, much like the Sydney Sleeper. However, this helps allies last longer rather than hurting enemies more. If there's lots of low-health allies around, or few medics, this would be preferable to the Sleeper.

Bushman's Onrush (Replaces SMG)

•  Gain kill-points on kills. Use up one for +35% movement speed for 4 seconds with alt-fire.
•  Kills with this weapon are worth double kill points, and assists gain one.
•  Locked to this weapon during a speed boost
•  Running out of this weapon's ammo will stop the boost immediately
•  -10 max health
•  -20% fire rate

The purpose of the Bushman's Onrush is to leap forward quickly into a new position. Less health makes you vunerable if you try to rampage.

The Blast Jar (Replaces SMG)

•  Works like Jarate
•  Knocks back players and deflects projectiles like an airblast
•  +50% recharge rate
•  +15% weapon switch

Get enemies out of close range with the Blast Jar! Also deals with rockets if you're skilled enough. Switch quickly to a rifle and pick off that pesky player.

Spy Suggestions

The Spy is one of my most-played classes.

Conniver's Kunai fix

This dagger is woefully under-used for the massive risk it carries. Here's a suggestion:

•  On second Backstab and so on: Raise max health by 10
  •  Capped at 6 times per life (for +60 health, bringing you to 120)

You still start with 60 health, and you still gain huge overheals. However, it rewards high-skill spies further.

Smoke Powder (Replaces Invis Watch)

•  +25% Cloak duration
•  Cloak creates a large-area smoke effect and leaves you semi-visible for 1 second

Smoke Powder gives you more time to hide, but has an obvious cloak effect, making it better for sneaking in than escaping.

Siphoner (Replaces Sapper)

•  Sapper damage recovers slight health and cloak when in close range
  •  Requires at least 1 second after placing before it starts generating charge
•  Can regain ammo from building frags
•  Sapper is removed in 1 hit by any enemy damage

A fragile metal/foil device.

The Siphoner is to squeeze more out of an unattended base. If there's no enemies around, this can be an amazing tool for recovery. Or, alternatively, if the Engie's out the way, sap away. Remember, however, that just one enemy will render your sapper useless.

Misery's Beacon (Replaces Sapper)

•  Nearby enemies are slowed in both movement speed and fire rate
•  Can be applied along with a different Sapper, so long as another Spy's avalible
•  The effect is obvious to enemies when they have it
•  -100% damage

Weaken enemies greatly with a sapper intended to debuff. Great for opportunities when the Engie's out.

Beacon of Weakness (Replaces Sapper)

•  Prevents near enemies from critting; they will mini-crit instead.
  •  Overrides the Bushwacka; it will only mini-crit
•  Can be applied along with a different Sapper, so long as another Spy's avalible
•  The effect is obvious to enemies when they have it
•  -100% damage

Rapier (Replaces Knife)

•  +37% range
•  +50% damage on regular hit
•  Would use a custom backstab animation, due to weapon's length. Animations similar to the Sharp Dresser would do.
•  -50% backstab radius

Hold your own better in one-on-one fights and stab from a safer distance with the Rapier - every Gentleman's friend.

The Rapier's strengths lie in more precise players. Those accurate at backstabbing can overcome the downside and use the weapon effectively on 1v1 duels.

The Lone Shark

A set focusing on survival, and weakening players rather than direct kills.

Legshot (Replaces Revolver)

•  On hit: Slows player for up to 1.5 seconds
  •  The closer you are to the player, the less time it slows them for
•  -25% damage

While the slowdown effect is designed to make it very difficult to use effectively for yourself, it can be great if you're pairing up with other Spies or Snipers.

The Rapid Recovery (Replaces Invis Watch)

•  +3 health regen per second while in use
  •  Does not put out fire, bleeding effects or anything similar
•  +10% movement speed while in use
•  Charge can only be replenished by a backstab, which fully charges the cloak.
  •  Alternative sources of cloak (Big Earner, etc) will build up a "bonus cloak" meter, which will provide a regular cloak when the Rapid Recovery runs out. Decloaking while in "bonus cloak" will wipe the meter.
•  -10% cloak on decloak

For escaping rather than running in, the Rapid Recovery is useless if you can't land a backstab, but powerful if you can chain them. While tricky to use with Your Eternal Reward, you can use the cloak once initially, that should be enough for that first backstab. Rapid cloaking and decloaking is mildly discouraged to prevent abuse.

Switch-Flicker (Replaces Sapper)

•  Shoot one of your sappers for area-of-effect blast damage, which removes the sapper.
•  Sapper: +50% health (Requires three Wrench hits or two Homewrecker hits)
•  -50% damage from your sappers
•  +0.5 sec delay between sapper placement

Taking advantage of the new Sapper loadout slot.

Switch-Flickers are intended when there are no or few engineers guarding buildings, but a few other players around. Blow up those Spy-checkers from a distance. However, it removes the sapper, so don't use it when the Sentry's on high health!

The Finisher (Replaces Knife)

•  +25 max health on wearer
•  Backstabs only deal 60% of target's max (non-overhealed) health
  •  Boosts such as heads for the Eyelander or the Dalokohs Bar count as higher max health, so the backstab will do more damage

Less effective for killing off long-distance classes like Soldiers and Snipers, but more effective in midst of the battle. The extra health allows you to survive better, and in intense battle situations, the damage penalty is minor.

Demoman Suggestions

Demomen are currently torn between the regular Demoman, and the Demoknight, with few combat options for both sides.

Oxymoron (Replaces Grenade Launcher)

•  Hold down fire for long-range shots (Like the Stickybomb Launcher)
•  +0.5 sec time grenades last for
•  -15% damage

A long-range precise weapon for the Demoman? That can't be right!

The Mini-Launcher (Replaces Grenade Launcher)

•  +50% clip size
•  +25% max ammo
•  +25% reload rate
•  +25% fire rate
•  -40% damage
•  -40% blast radius

A more reliable Grenade Launcher for Stickybomb lovers. Why? Because it's a useful one-on-one weapon which the Stickybomb Launcher isn't.

The Long Shot (Replaces Stickybomb Launcher)

•  Double charge rate (as in the charge for long-range shots)
•  Mid-air shots cannot be detonated.
  •  If one's already out while firing a shot and attempting to detonate, the one out will detonate but the one firing won't.

The Long Shot aids in longer-distance area denial and leaves you less vunerable to Snipers. The lack of airbursts mean you need to rely more on the grenade launcher for up-front fighting.

The Multishot (Replaces Stickybomb Launcher)

•  If multiple targets are killed/destroyed in one shot...
  •  50% faster reload and fire rate for a brief time
  •  The more targets destroyed, the longer this time lasts
•  -25% clip size
•  -10% damage

Blast through a group of players rapidly with the Multishot, which allows you to rapidly destroy a group of people (or buildings)

Brew O' Old Glasgow (Replaces Bottle)

•  Special taunt (Must recharge after each use):
  •  Heal 75 health
  •  Highly drunk for 5 seconds, significantly lowering accuracy
•  -25% swing speed
  •  Due to this, the bottle doesn't break on crits

Poor Demoman. There isn't anything left in your normal bottle. And you ain't gonna get anything in that frying pan, either.

Old Glagow's brew is handy for isolated, low health situations and is more for the classic Demoman than the Demoknight.

Maniac's Dosage (Replaces Bottle)

•  Doesn't break on crits
•  Special taunt (Must recharge after each use):
  •  -50% blast damage taken for 5 seconds
  •  Cannot switch weapon for 5 seconds
•  +20% fire vunerability on wearer

For Sticky Jumping, this works brilliantly. Less damage taken allows you to last longer and works great for lone roaming. However, long switch time makes it mostly useful for when the threat's already taken out on the other end - more of a mobility thing than anything else.

The Solway Solution

A set focusing on area denial techniques and heavy knockback.

The Carpet Bomber (Replaces Grenade Launcher)

•  Grenades last +50% longer before exploding
•  +25% reload rate
•  Grenades bounce less and roll more
•  -20% direct hit damage

For holding off an area, the Carpet Bomber does well. You can hold off a corridoor fairly well. Its indirect-favouring nature makes it harder in 1v1 fights, however.

The Scatterer (Replaces Stickybomb Launcher)

•  +50% knockback
  •  No effect on sticky jumping
•  +0.5 sec priming time
•  -25% damage

Send opponents flying. Separate Medics from their patients. Blast a team all over the place.

Border's Respite (Replaces Bottle)

•  Crits enemies in the air by explosions
•  Kill taunt (same as Ullapool Caber, but actually works as one)
•  No random critical hits

Skilled with the Scatterer? The Border's Respite lets you fire opponents right into your crit-bottle. Alternatively, pair up with a Soldier for a lethal combo.

Lochdrainer

A rather 1940s-esque set dealing with huge explosions.

The Bouncing Bomb (Replaces Grenade Launcher)

•  +10% explosion radius (not on a direct hit)
•  Grenades last 25% longer before exploding
•  Grenades bounce 50% harder (making firing around corners easier)
•  -25% damage on direct hits
•  +10% reload time

Back to what made the Demoman a Demoman - demolition. The Bouncing Bomb specialises in building demolition with a superior bouncing ability, but is weaker at direct player-busting. Essentially, it's made for indirect fighting.

Landmine Launcher (Replaces Stickybomb Launcher)

•  Mines explode on enemy contact, or when destroyed by enemies
•  Mines are larger than stickybombs
•  -50% blast radius when manually detonated

The makeshift landmines look like they're probably partially made of asbestos and plaster.

Landmines work rather defensively, and are best for taking out Scouts, who are unlikely to check where they're going.

Demoknight Suggestions

Just had to split the Demoknight ones to prevent confusion.

Demoknight Fixes

Taking up the mantle of a Demoknight needs to be more pratical. Currently, a lot of the routes are underpowered, so here's some ideas to fix that:

• Give 2x charge rate to Ali Baba's Wee Booties instead of the Persian Persuader. The Persian Persuader can then get more healing than it does now from ammo packs and pickups. That way, the Wee Booties are established as a Demoknight weapon, give full Demoknights far more options, and the Persian Persuader can fill its old roles.
• Slightly increase the charge time increase for the Claidheamh Mòr.

Saltire Satire (Replaces Stickybomb Launcher)

•  Acts as a shield, rather than a Stickybomb Launcher (obviously, as this is in the Demoknight section)

•  Charge provides high knockback to a hit opponent
•  +50% all resistances while charging
•  Immune to movement-imparing effects while charging
•  Immune to crits while charging (they will only do normal damage)
•  Noticable charge effect distinguishable from other shields
•  No crit-boost while charging

The melee weapon you use here matters less (though the Claidheamh Mòr works fairly well). This is more for situational utility (such as an Ubercharge). Usually, charging would be suicidal, as you'd be knocked asunder and torn to shreds via bullets. However, resistances and an unmovable force makes you able to be the hero. Fast speed AND lots of survivability? Finally, the Demoknight can be useful somewhere.

Stickycharge (Replaces Stickybomb Launcher)

•  Acts as a shield

•  Shield bash deals explosive damage in set radius
  •  No self-damage from this charge
  •  The explosive attachment must recover over time, which takes three times as long as charge recovery
•  +20% explosive damage resistance on wearer
•  +20% fire resistance on wearer

Rather than long-range group busting, do it close up! Particularly fatal with the Ullapool Caber.

Spree Killer (Replaces Bottle)

•  +37% larger range (Like the other swords)
•  On kill: Instantly recharge Charge
•  -25% damage

Not the strongest weapon around there, but one that can make a skilled Demoknight or semi-Demoknight charge-mad.

Soldier Suggestions

Gunboats changes

The Gunboats are a little weak at the moment and under-used. I suggest that a Soldier wearing Gunboats should take a bit less fall damage (maybe 20% less?) so to further encourage rocket jumps.

Pain Train changes

The Pain Train currently is only useful in certain game modes. I suggest a bunch of new additions to make it have broader usage.

•  +15% movement speed when carrying Intelligence/Australium
•  Credits in Mann vs. Machine heal you (not as effective as the Scout's ability, though.)
•  Negative stat does not apply if no positive stat applies in your game mode

The Average American Set

Remember the Soldier tutorial? How it told you to use melee close, shotguns at mid-range and rockets from afar? This set is specifically designed for the adaptable Soldier. However, it's not great at suprise attacks.

Brickmortar (Replaces Rocket Launcher)

•  +15% blast radius and +10% damage for long-ranged attacks (Cancelling out the damage penalty)
•  +10% reload rate
•  -10% damage
•  +25% self-damage
  •  Does not affect rocket jumping
•  -50% ramp-up

Hit 'em from afar with the Brickmortar, a Rocket Launcher designed for long-ranged combat, but unlike the Direct Hit, can't do lots of damage up close, and can affect a nice radius.

The Middle American (Replaces Shotgun)

•  +25% damage
•  +20% distance before drop-off
•  -50% ramp-up
•  +50% drop-off
•  -33% clip size

The Middle American is best suited for mid-range combat, where it excels. Close-up or far-away, it doesn't do so well.

The Backyard Bruiser (Replaces Shovel)

•  Minicrits 5 seconds after last connecting shot of Primary or Secondary weapons
•  -35% damage outside this window of time
•  No random crits

Finish 'em with a high-damage attack courtesy of the Backyard Bruiser! Especially effective for juggled opponents.

Scout Suggestions

Might as well go on for every class now.

The Lead Weight (Replaces Scattergun)

•  +15% reload rate
•  +10% damage
•  No random critical hits
•  -13% movement speed on wearer (lowering the Scout to 120%)
•  -50% double jump height

The Lead Weight aids in the Scout holding his own. He'll still be faster than most, and the weaker double jump is still better than no double jump. This pairs better with a Medic than the Scout usually does, as lower speed means the Medic can keep up with him.

Sack o' Metal (Replaces Pistol)

•  Allows the Scout to collect metal, with a limit of 100
•  With 100 metal, select and use to drop a medium ammo box
  •  Cannot collect your own ammo box
•  Metal can only be obtained from dead players (weapons)

It's a slightly odd idea, inspired by the early idea of letting Scouts carry health and ammo packs. For Scouts in defence, this can be particularly useful.

Improvised Imbecile (Replaces Bat)

A lead pipe. While originally, the lead pipe was to be a Heavy weapon, it works well enough as a bat.

•  Damage and attack interval is the same as most stock melee weapons (65 damage, 0.8s interval)
•  +15% weapon switch speed
•  On hit: -10 health

An effective weapon for a quick hit between reloads, but ineffective in long-run attacking, this lead pipe works especially well as a heckling weapon against a single target.

The Recall Recoil (Replaces Bat)

An inflatable Bonk! hammer, marred only by its unusually sharp edges, hard surface and asbestos-lined interior.

•  On hit on a second jump:
  •  Mini-crits
  •  Provides knockback (like a Force Jump)
  •  Bursts and must replenish to reach full usage. In the mean-time, does -90% damage.
•  No random critical hits

Heavy Suggestions

Ongoer (Replaces Minigun)

•  -50% move penalty while spun
•  Cannot spin-up with alt-fire
•  -10% damage
•  +20% drop-off

The Ongoer is intended for short-range combat and rampages. It's particularly effective for Ubercharges.

Alternative stats

•  -50% move penalty while spun
•  +25% spin-down
•  -20% damage
•  Prolonged use slows the Heavy down

Terrible with Ubercharges but good as a starting weapon, followed by a finishing Shotgun hit.

Shotgun of Steel Recharge (Replaces Shotgun)

"Sasha shall eat you!"

•  +20 primary ammo on hit
•  +30 additional primary ammo on kill
•  -25% bullet spread
•  -15% damage
•  -25% rate of fire

While weak at general fighting and prolonged fights, the SSR works well for killing cowards, finishing off players and making sure you can keep your minigun going.

Helpful Hands (Replaces Fists)

•  +10% heal rate from healers (Medics/Dispensers)
  •  An additional 15% while this weapon is out
•  -10% healing from other sources (Sandviches/Health Packs)
•  +15% switch time
•  -20% fire rate
•  -20% damage

While this may seem in danger of being a crutch (bad Heavies might just stick to their primary weapon at all times, using the health bonus without the downsides) the additional healing by switching to this weapon makes knowing when to switch important. The slow switch time and lower damage means you really don't want to be caught out without the right weapon. Lower sandvich healing prevents this being essentially a straight upgrade.

Completing Sets

Weapon sets with only two items have a choice in what to additionally take. Sometimes, it's situational, but often, the choices are fairly clear.

Soldier: Tank Buster

Here, the options are melee weapons. Seeing as the Battalion's Backup relies on damage taken, (not given,) survivability is important. For that reason, the Escape Plan is probably the best choice here.

Soldier: General's Formals

As it's primary weapons that are avaliable, you have plenty of choice here. The Black Box would probably be ideal for maitaining health (as you're likely to be running through some dangerous places, e.g. Sentry nests, with your speed). Alternatively, the Rocket Jumper can go with the Mantreads, though generally that's a bad idea.

Soldier: Victory Pack

The Victory Pack is a more long-ranged set for lasting a long time. Again, the Escape Plan is a good choice, as it gives both speed and damage at low health, giving you a more effective close-range option.

Pyro: Gas Jockey's Gear

Seeing as you can't use the Axtinguisher, the Flare Gun or Detonator makes up for the lack of that, as well as giving you the ability to top-up fire damage - Use the Degreaser to set fire, use the Flare Gun/Detonator to increase the afterburn damage. If you find yourself killing people before you have a chance to use the Powerjack, try using the Detonator rather than the Flare Gun.

Edit: The Reserve Shooter works very effectively. A super-fast switch time coupled with extra damage to airblast + switch tactics makes this work well. Edit 2: The Scorch Shot can help in pinning players to a position where the Powerjack can hit them.

Demoman: Expert's Ordnance

The Chargin' Targe pairs well with this set, making Pyros less than half as effective on you, making fights against Soldiers easier and making up for the lack of a random critical on the Ullapool Caber.

Engineer: Braniac Pack

The fast set-up offered by the Eureka Effect makes the Wrangler a good choice (as it relies on a strong Sentry Gun). Seeing as the Pomson can be used for long-ranged attacks, and never runs out of ammo, you don't really need the Pistol.

Medieval Medic

The Medieval Medic set favours group healing, something the Quick Fix is good at. Seeing as you have slightly better survivability, the regular Medi Gun with its slow Ubercharge rate can be fairly effective too.

Sniper: Lawrence of Austrailia

Seeing as you'll be going in for consecutive headshots, you'll not want to be interrupted. The Razorback is a good choice for that. Alternatively, and especially if there's few Spies around, Darwin's Danger Shield pairs pretty well with the Shahanshah - seeing as you have more survivability, what doesn't kill you will make you stronger.

The Saharan Spy

The Dead Ringer seems obvious, but an inability to disguise is a problem when using the Dead Ringer. If you're taking a different watch, either be careful where you step or remove the hat so the set penalty doesn't affect you.

Spy: Man of Honour

Again, the Dead Ringer works best here. Increased time to cloak doesn't affect the Dead Ringer, and landing a backstab gives you potential to feign death after.

Demoknight Strategy

Demoknights are any Demoman player who takes the Chargin' Targe or the Splendid Screen. A proper Demoknight also takes Ali Baba's Wee Booties, of course, but this is only any good if you're in Medieval Mode (Edit: Also MvM), highly skilled at charges or bad at using the Grenade Launchers.

The Chargin' Targe

The Chargin' Targe is the more defensive of the two shields. As well as reducing explosive damage, it reduces fire damage - making it easier to get close to Pyros for a melee swing. Generally, choose this shield over the Splendid Screen for use with the Eyelander (unless you're good at collecting heads)

The Splendid Screen

The more offensive of the two shields, the Splendid Screen does more damage and frequently kills people via charge damage. You could use it as a weapon itself and not bother with a particularly Demoknight-orientated Melee weapon.

Eyelander

The classic Demoknight weapon. If you're using this, be sure to use it and get a speed boost for the first head. Just two heads are enough to overcome the inital health disadvantage, and that coupled with your speed will make a deadly combo. If you can manage to collect heads without using a shield, you can quickly plant a stickybomb carpet without the fear of backstab or headshot. The Eyelander is best used with the Chargin' Targe as it covers some of the weaknesses you'll have.

Persian Persuader

If you're a full Demoknight, this weapon has no drawbacks. If you're skilled at charging, this is the sword for you - you can kill many players with one critical swing, and the weapons they drop will provide enough health to cover any you've lost. Double charge regeneration rate lets you kill even more players. If you're not a full Demoknight, however, this has a large disadvantage - you'll run out of ammo on your Grenade Launcher.

Pain Train

Not a traditional Demoknight weapon, but the shields' speed bonus coupled with a faster capture rate can aid your team massively - the capture rate of a Scout, with more health and more team-busting ability for any responses.

Half-Zaiochi

You've got to be skilled to pull this off. The Half-Zaiochi has a smaller melee range, so you'll find it harder to kill opponents. Full Demomen will find this sword with no downsides, and it's a more reliable health renewal than the Persian Persuader.

Ullapool Caber

Don't rely on this as a main source of damage - only take this with a shield if you're skilled enough with the Grenade Launcher (or Loch-and-Load, consider whether you want the set bonus or not.) A critical hit with this thing, though is enough to wipe out a small army. You could equipt it only if you know there's a good chance you'll need it on respawn.

Claidheamh Mòr

If you can do without the speed bonus the Eyelander brings, or you have trouble taking more than one head a life, this sword is a good substitute. While having it with the Wee Booties may seem effective, the turning control on the boots isn't spectacular and you're best off just taking the Grenade Launcher instead, as you have enough health to use it the same way as always.

Mann VS Machine Loadouts and Upgrades

Unlike normal gameplay, the rules of sidegrades can be fairly different in Mann VS Machine, with some downsides easily covered by certain credit-based upgrades, and some that can't be covered.

Scout

Shortstop

The Shortstop is accurate, doesn't require you to get as close for good damage and reloads fast. As such, it's brilliant for MvM.

• Damage - As is nearly always the case, the cost of boosting damage means it's best left for later on.
• Clip Size - Due to the Shortstop's clip-based reload, this is very powerful and probably more useful than pure Damage for the same cost.
• Projectile Penetration - High-accuracy weapons always benefit from this. Good for pushing just that little bit more damage in.
• Ammo Capacity - This isn't particularly useful until it starts becoming a problem, so you can leave it out at first.
• Fire Rate - Cheaper than others on the table, but also weaker. Clip size is probably better to go for first.
• Health on Kill - Lacking Scattergun-style Meatshots, you're a little less likely to get kills. The effect is mildly weaker if you have the full Special Delivery set, too, but then again, health is health. If you're mostly scoring assists, you can skip this.

Baby-Face's Blaster

High accuracy is pretty useful for when you get penetrating shots, while the speed allows you to pick off Scout-bots with the bomb. Damage output is a key issue, though.

• Damage - With a 400 credit cost a time, covering the Blaster's downside is going to be pretty expensive. As a very squishy class, you may want to boost survivability first.
• Clip Size - As the Blaster has a clip size larger than most Scatterguns, this won't be a problem early on. It could be useful for prolonged combat later on, but as a Scout you may have trouble doing that.
• Projectile Penetration - Particularly effective with the Blaster's high accuracy. You can probably build Boost with one shot doing this, meaning you can probably safely jump more than normal.
• Ammo Capacity - You've got a fair ammo pool, and as a Scout, getting to ammo packs is no problem. Maybe useful against Tanks or later waves, but not early on.
• Reload Speed - As a fast class, reload is a key thing that slows you down. This could be very handy for chasing down Super Scouts or anything you need prolonged hits for.
• Firing Rate - Goes alright with Projectile Penetration so you can make kills before anyone knew what you were doing.
• Health on Kill - Stacks with the Scout's money-grabbing ability. Alright for quick recovery. Seeing as the weapon's weak, though, you may want to boost damage before doing this, so you can actually get kills rather than lots of assists.

Mad Milk

A brilliant secondary-weapon choice, as players will be doing more damage than usual and taking less, so they can heal well from Mad Milk. Additionally, the slowdown upgrade helps deal with the bomb-carrier.

• Recharge Rate - It costs 1000 credits to get a 60% faster recharge rate. This may seem costly, but remember that it could be the difference between the bomb-carrier getting to the hole or not. Unless you're really skilled with Scatterguns, this is a good idea to focus on after you've got the slowdown upgrade.
• Slowdown - Get this immediately. This reduces the threat of bomb-carriers and suchlike immensely, as they'll not only get to the hatch slower, but they're also easier targets. Add the health players get back from Mad Milk, and it makes it a very powerful upgrade. Plus, at 200 credits, it's cheap.

Pretty Boy's Pocket Pistol

While fire vunerability is a huge problem with the number of Pyros, for 300 credits you can completely cover this. You can cover the fire rate for another 300. The health bonus is particularly useful as you can't boost your max health with credits.

• Clip Size - Alright for prolonged use, but there's not many occasions you'll need your Pistol for that long (except for Pyros due to fire vunerability), and you'll very rapidly run out of ammo. Only really any good for a heavily-Pyro-based round.
• Projectile Penetration - Fairly handy for a long-range weapon.
• Ammo Capacity - Useful as a whole because the Scout's pistols tend to run out of ammo easily. Do this before boosting clip size, if you must boost the clip.
• Fire Speed - It's fairly costly to cover the fire rate downside, but it's useful if you focus heavily on the pistol for its combat abilities rather than its passive ones.
• Health on Kill - You're not going to make many kills with this weapon, so you may want to avoid this.

Flying Guillotine

A decent-damage weapon great for one-on-one combat and can go well with the multi-shot of the Sandman.

• Recharge Rate - The only upgrade, unfortunately. This allows the Flying Guillotine to recharge at a rate comparable to a slightly slow reload, though you can also do damage with other weapons in that time. This is a great upgrade to have to chain-crit with the Sandman, or just to do lots of long-ranged damage. The main reason for not upgrading it is to allow for the fact you're likely going to have to switch to Mad Milk at some point to keep bomb-bots at bay.

Sandman

Survivability is all-important in MvM, making the health penalty quite a problem. However, picking power is what this weapon excels at, and that's great against the larger bots. So, if swarms are your key weakness, this may not be the weapon for you, but if the large bots are, this is great.

• Ball Marks Target - Even better for quick killing. Make sure you're actually killing what you stun rather than using it as crowd control, or else you're wasting 500 credits.
• Recharge Rate - Stacks brilliantly with misc ammo cap. If you're focusing heavily on crowd control while, say, an Engie finishes the rest off, you've got a very deadly combo. More expensive than some other options, though, so pick this later rather than sooner.
• Attack Rate - Not so great as it appears, as there's little if no visible benefit for launching baseballs. Plus, it's 200 credits a time for a small bonus. Unless you use your melee weapon for prolonged lengths of time, don't bother.
• Misc Ammo Bonus - Cheap and super-effective. Now, you can take out a whole team of Medics. Get this, the marking ability and high recharge rate and an Engie and watch the cash roll in. Probably good to go for first. Remember, though, as each ball needs to recharge separately, so while that stops you entirely depending on the weapon, it reduces the wastage from not using it.
• Health on Kill - The Sandman is for crowd control rather than killing. You can't boost melee defence, and getting into melee range may attract melee bots - your low health won't help. The Misc ammo bonus is the same price and far more useful.

Candy Cane

While a small health pack is useful, you're getting it through cash and Health-On-Kill anyway. Plus, the explosive vunerability is quite a problem. Still, if you feel the health is more important, it's alright, so long as you cover the explosive vunerability sooner rather than later (it costs 350 credits to cover this downside)

• Attack Rate - The Scout's fast anyway at attacking, which makes this mildly redundant as it doesn't make as much of a difference as the slower-and-stronger melee weapons of other classes. Explosive vunerability means you could be 1-shot if you try to melee with Demospam or Soldiers around.
• Health on Kill - You're not going to make many kills on this, as a whole. Probably not worth it.

Wrap Assassin

While less powerful than the Sandman, it's much less risky, and seeing as you won't be meleeing much, pratically a straight upgrade to the Bat.

• Recharge Rate - Good for maitaining bleeds, but it's probably better to get a higher misc ammo limit first as it's cheaper and the recharge rate becomes more useful with it.
• Misc Ammo Bonus - Great for slipping bleeds in to your opponents. Usually, bots have no defence against bleeds, making them extra-effective. Plus, you can severly weaken some of the weaker bots. Unfortunately, you don't get the phycological bonus you get against players, who will tend to flee to a health pack. This is cheap to upgrade so if you use the Assassin a lot, very much worth it.
• Health on Kill - While a little more likely to kill than many Scout Melees, it's not much of a finisher and as such, adding Health on Kill won't gain much.

Soldier

Beggar's Bazooka

Projectile deviation and huge vollies can do incredible damage to a large group of people. Grab a Kritz Medic or a Buff Banner for maximum effect!

• Damage - Powerful but expensive. You should probably cover your weaknesses first.
• Clip Size - Greatly effective, as you can now unleash huge barrages. Take out entire squads in one go! However, you're going to spend ages reloading so boost Reload Rate along with it. Also, you may run out of ammo quickly - keep in mind you can't use dispensers.
• Ammo Capacity - A good idea after the inital clip size/reload rate boost, as you can't reload through dispensers and as such you'll run out of ammo fast.
• Reload Rate - Covers the key weapon weakness. Get this sooner rather than later to ensure you can't be caught out easily.
• Fire Rate - This weapon fires fast anyway, so there's not much advantage to be gained here.
• Health on Kill - Nice for crit-boosts and the like. You may not need to upgrade this very far for maximum effect, so just one point in could still be good. If you're standing back for your shots, however, this isn't so useful, as you won't be attacked as much.
• Projectile Speed - Better for if you're keeping back. So, if you're close, go for health-on-kill, if you're far away, get projectile speed. However, boosting reload, clip and ammo capacity are probably higher priorities.

Buff Banner

The Buff Banner's powerful anyway, and mini-crits across your team are particulary good for long-range attacks. But, remember, mini-crits also get ramp up bonuses (unlike regular crits) so classes like Scouts can gain a lot.

• Buff Duration - The only upgrade avaliable, and only two points of upgrade. Max it out for 500 credits and you'll have 50% longer duration, a very handy boost as you can get more rockets in. Try it with a fast-reload high-clip Beggar's Bazooka.

Disciplinary Action

Good for pushing forward when an Engie's base is down, but also good for its long melee range, making it decent as a fallback weapon.

• Attack Speed - Not very useful for combat due to the damage penalty, but every bit helps for maitaining your speed bonus. However, these are credits better spent on the Rocket Launchers.
• Health on Kill - Like most Melee weapons, not really worth it. You're going to rarely if at all get a melee kill with that thing.

---

Loadout - The Rain of Terror

This loadout is kinda weak at first, but is stupidly effective against swarms later on.

Weapons

• Primary: Beggar's Bazooka
• Secondary: Buff Banner
• Melee: Anything, but Disc Action is good.

You'll be doing most of your fighting at range, buffing the banner and your primary weapon instead of base stats as a whole, reling on the mini-crits to cover the reduced long-range damage.

Upgrade Progression

This is by no means perfect. If you die a lot on one wave and fail it, boost resistances instead before returning to this progression. You may discover a better route.

1. Focus on reload rate, and get it maxed out ASAP. 2 lots of reload, 1 ammo capacity and 1 reload again works well.
2. Now, maximise the ammo capacity.
3. Now time to help the team - buff the Buff Banner to maximum duration.
4. Start boosting clip size

If you have any cash left over, boost resistances as appropriate, or Health on Kill. Getting one tier of passive healing is handy for downtime between waves of robots.

The crucial thing to remember is not to get too close to the bots. Upgrading the Bazooka is expensive, and you won't be able to afford both it and resistances, so keep back and let other players do the tanking. Also, the projectile deviation means occasionally some mis-fired rockets could mis-aim slightly and hurt you with self-damage.

Pyro

Backburner

It's fairly easy to ambush bots when they spawn, but the knockback feature of airblasts is something vitally useful for dealing with bomb carriers and making it more expensive is a big risk.

• Damage - Because a skilled Pyro should be ambushing for back-crits, this becomes even more powerful for building on its strengths. However, attacking up close makes you fragile, so focus on survivability first.
• Ammo Capacity - Helps cover the airblast cost flaw, if nothing else. If you're really in need of airblasting, this can get the job done. Otherwise, becomes compulsory later on, but not as big a priority as explosive weapons for the Demoman or Soldier.
• Afterburn Damage - Because you'll be focusing on back-crits, afterburn is a little less useful, but extra damage is still nice anyway. Good if you're going kamikaze, but as a whole, pure damage is probably better for the Backburner.
• Afterburn Duration - Very similar again. Afterburn duration is a bit worse against Medic-healed bots and very fast ones (who can deploy the bomb fast) but better for Axtinguisher attacks. But, with the Backburner, you're better off with pure damage than afterburn buffs.
• Health on Kill - Very handy as you'll be killing rather than weakening, allowing you to keep going longer. A decent choice as a whole.
• Airblast Force - With the high airblast cost, you'll be airblasting less than normal, but airblasting is still vitally important. This could help make those airblasts more efficent, meaning you need fewer of them.

Phlogistinator

The crit-boost and heal effect is great against hordes of enemies. However, no airblast is a huge downside. Try taking the Scorch Shot with it if your aim's good to deal with the bomb-bot. Be sure to take Uber canteens or have a Uber Medic on hand, too, to avoid wasting the crits.

• Damage - VERY powerful. Maxed out, when you're critting, you'll be dealing six times the damage of a regular flamethrower, or more if you take damage drop-off into account.
• Ammo Capacity - Handy because of your heavy use of W + M1 rather than hit and run.
• Afterburn Damage - Because your afterburn doesn't crit unlike your direct damage, it's fair enough to ignore this to focus on damage boosting.
• Afterburn Duration - Again, not particularly helpful, though one idea is to use an Uber canteen, boost Afterburn duration, set fire to a Giant and Axtinguisher-spam. Then again, you can do that with any flamethrower.
• Health on Kill - Because you're dealing vast amount of damage during crits (and you don't want to waste it,) this is a useful bonus and worth having.

Flare Gun

A powerful, high-damage ranged picking weapon, this is decent for some of the larger enemies.

• Afterburn Damage - Handy if you're switching targets, but generally most damage output will be from your 90-crit flares.
• Afterburn Duration - Good if your aim is off, or again, you're switching between targets. More useful than Afterburn damage for the Flare Gun.
• Reload Rate - The reload's not bad, and it's passive as well, but a higher reload rate means a better fire rate and therefore more crit flares, making it great to do this.
• Ammo Capacity - The Flare Gun's ammo supply is quite low so if you're using it heavily, it's quite worth it.
• Fire Rate - Probably better to upgrade Reload Rate first, as it's 20% vs. the 10% fire rate bonus for boosting this.
• Health on Kill - As the Flare Gun's used as a finisher, this can be reasonably effective, but as you'll be mainly using this on large opponents, you wouldn't get that many kills. Depends on the manner in which you use the Flare Gun. If there's another Pyro in your team igniting lots of enemies, this can be good.

Scorch Shot

While it can't chain-crit, the Scorch Shot excels in knocking back the smaller bomb-carrying robots. Its lower damage than other secondary weapons means you're going to have to focus on resistances and your flamethrower to be able to make kills.

• Afterburn Damage - As you ignite robots in a small radius, and they tend to group together, this isn't so bad. However, you can't rely on the Scorch Shot for damage, so the credit cost may be better spent on your primary weapon or resistances.
• Afterburn Duration - Best-used with the Axtinguisher or another Pyro with an appropriate weapon. Igniting several opponents allows a Pyro with the right weapon to get lots of crits. If you're that Pyro, taking an Uber canteen may be a good idea. Nonetheless, be careful you're not wasting credits on this ability rather than more useful ones.
• Reload Rate - A rapid fire rate allows you to keep knocking back the bomb-carrier, making this one of the better upgrades for the Scorch Shot.
• Ammo Capacity - Not so useful. You won't be using the Scorch Shot for prolonged lengths of time, generally, so upping its max ammo is fairly redundant.
• Fire Rate - Like reload rate, this is a good thing to have for troublesome bomb-bots. Seeing as it boosts you less than reload rate, get that first.
• Health on Kill - Lots of afterburn might damage lots of robots, but it won't score many kills. Health on Kill for the Scorch Shot is unreliable and not such a great idea.

Axtinguisher

The Axtinguisher is a 1v1 weapon and as such does a little worse in MvM. However, if you take an Uber Canteen, you can set fire to a Giant and chain crits with the Axtinguisher. One interesting note is that it does normal damage on tanks - no more, no less.

• Attack Speed - Handy if pulling off the Ubercharge-Burn Giant-Crit Giant tactic mentioned above, but against smaller monsters, 1 hit will usually be enough. Situational.
• Health on Kill - As a finisher, health on kill is alright for the Axtinguisher, but as a melee weapon, it's risky to use it heavily. It's cheap to upgrade this, though, so if you use it heavily, go for it.

Back Scratcher

Great for lone Pyros (and a straight upgrade if you somehow have neither Medic nor Engineer). The extra health from health packs is quite powerful, but many are large anyway, making that advantage redundant. If you do have a Medic, you may waste their time with the time it takes to heal you. Mostly, you'll be using this to hit undefended tanks with its decent damage.

• Attack Speed - As a high-damage Melee, a faster attack rate is a good thing, but generally you'll only be using this weapon on Tanks. If they're a problem, though, having a fast, high-damage weapon is pretty handy.
• Health on Kill - You won't score many kills with this, so it's not such a great idea.

Third Degree

Its niche role is more powerful in Mann vs. Machine where it's possible to have large robots healed by multiple Medics, so you can hit lots of Medics in one hit. Works particularly well with an Ubercharge or Crit-boost - the Ubercharge prevents the robot being healed being a threat, and a crit-boost lets you take out all the Medics at once.

• Attack Speed - Handy if Octoheavies and suchlike are a huge problem. A better attack rate can allow you to kill all the Medics before they have a chance to heal up or Ubercharge. Less effective if you're using crit-boosts, though, as one hit will take them all out, making attack rate useless (except for Giant Medics).
• Health on Kill - Taking out several Medics at once will provide a massive amount of health. This is quite handy for surviving the giant robot they're likely to be healing, though the Overheal limit means it may be useful just to boost this once.

Neon Annihilator

There's no water in the current MvM maps which makes it harder to use this weapon's main feature - you have to rely on other players' Jarate or Mad Milk. However, due to the slowdown they can be boosted to provide, you see them often in MvM (especially Mad Milk, most Scouts tend to carry it.) Also, the slowdown makes it easier to chase these enemies down. Because of this niche ability, it's best not to upgrade this weapon until you know someone definitely does or doesn't have Jarate or Mad Milk - just replace it with a different weapon if no-one does. The Sapper-removal ability is weaker than the Homewrecker's, but as there's no enemy buildings in MvM, the Neon Annihilator's almost a straight upgrade compared to it.

• Attack Speed - Lets you remove Sappers quicker, but it doesn't make wet-crits much more effective, except for large robots. Try chain-critting a giant robot covered in Mad Milk, particularly if you have high resistances. Generally, though, it's not really worth boosting this.
• Health on Kill - Because this often is a finisher, there's some advantage to adding Health on Kill, but generally this weapon will see most use on Giants, and Mad Milk provides lots of health anyway. Generally, it's best to go for other upgrades first.

Demoman

Grenade Launcher

As lots of enemies are close together, blast damage is effective. It's hard to tell if the Loch-and-Load is worse, better or not. Probably sidegrades to each other.

• Damage - Become a brutal killing machine, and become better at taking out Tanks. While useful, upgrading this is very expensive and doesn't cover the Demoman's weaknesses. Cover them fire before you start upgrading damage.
• Clip Size - Yes! Cover a crippling weakness! This lets you also utilise Ubercharges very, very effectively. However, it's pretty costly, so if you're tight for cash you may want Reload speed instead. The two go well together.
• Ammo Capacity - With larger clips, you're more likely to run out of ammo. However, there's plenty of large ammo packs around. Generally, only upgrade this if and when it becomes a problem, not long before.
• Reload Speed - Cheaper than clip size. If you're not the Medic pocket, than this is probably a better option as it's cheaper.
• Firing Speed - A slight bonus, you can probably pass this up.
• Health on Kill - As the Grenade Launcher is the Demoman's main midst-of-battle fighting weapon, health on kill is handy for survivability. It also removes some of the risk of close-range grenades. However, like damage, it may be best to cover reload rate or clip size first.
• Projectile Speed - Fairly useful for long-range shots, but as a Demoman, you won't be pulling off many of those. You can safely pass this up.

Stickybomb Launcher

With the predictable paths of the bots, stickies are VERY powerful. And they won't complain if you spawncamp, too.

• Damage - Stack this with a Crit boost for huge damage. Effective! Again, expensive, though, so be careful not to overspend.
• Clip Size - Due to the sticky limit being the same as the clip size, this isn't particularly useful unless you deal in airshots. Plus, it's expensive, too.
• Ammo Capactiy - Similar to the GL, it's only really if and when it becomes a problem.
• Reload Rate - Fairly useful, if you lay several sticky carpets in a round. Try stacking this with firing speed for fast carpet-spam.
• Firing Speed - Great for laying a carpet quickly, not so great if you almost only fight with your Grenade Launcher. The effect's smaller than many on this table, but it's also cheaper.
• Health on Kill - Best for higher-skill Demomen who can swich between the Grenade Launcher and Stickybomb Launcher well, or those that use Stickies as a main weapon. If you're the Medic pocket, you may not need it.

Chargin' Targe Demoknight-inclined weapon

The Targe offers good starting fire and explosive resistances, though the respective upgrades will boost your resistance less than normal. As a result, it can be worth it (if you're good with the Grenade Launcher) to start with the shield, not upgrade it, and for the first difficult wave (or first tank wave) switch for a Stickybomb Launcher.

Of course, if you're Demoknighting, this has the advantage of higher resistances than the other shield but less impact damage. One option is to start with this, pour credits into resistances and switch to the Screen if you're taking a lot of damage.

• Charge Recharge - Nearly useless if you're only after resistances, but for most players using this shield, it's a cheap and effective upgrade, which helps you chase down troublesome Scout-bots or get more crits in. Boosting movement speed can help, too.

Splendid Screen Demoknight-inclined weapon

More for the more hardcore Demoknights, the Screen offers more damage but lower resistances.

• Charge Recharge - Cheap and pretty effective, and essential for total-Demoknights (pretty useful anyways so long as you're not neglecting resistances or the like)

Ullapool Caber

Great for when you're going to die anyway. Many melee weapons are risky without resistance bonuses as robots can do a lot of damage up-close, but the Caber's not for those times. It's for when there's no other option.

• Crits on Kill - Not very helpful as it's expensive, the Ullapool caber will become very weak after detonating, you'll probably die anyway and switching weapon will waste crit-time. If you can switch in time, though, I suppose the Caber's high odds of killing something can help in that respect.
• Attack Speed - Even worse. You aren't going to use the Caber for more than one hit at a time, so this is awful.
• Health on Kill - Interesting, as you could recover all the self-damage (besides fall damage) and carry on fighting. However, as the Ullapool Caber's for when you're going to die anyway, it's not really that useful unless you manage to take out multiple opponents.

Eyelander Demoknight-inclined weapon

The old Demoman classic. Heads are easy to come by in Mann vs. Machine, so it shouldn't be too bad getting 4 heads. You can't boost max health through upgrades, so that bonus is quite effective. Don't forget the speed boost and extra shield-bash damage, too. The speed boost stacks nicely with the passive speed boost for super-speed-knight.

Even if you're shieldless and bootless, the Eyelander can still be effective. You could use an Uber or Crit canteen to get heads (or just boost resistances) and use the health-speed bonus to assist in general Demoman stuff.

• Damage (Demoknight only) - More damage makes those charges, head-collecting and tank-bashing easier. It's very costly, though. Get some resistances first, particularly the bullet resistance, which the shields don't offer. In fact, it may be a good idea to boost shield charge recharge rate too.
• Crits on Kill - Great for quick head-collecting, though this upgrade is expensive. If you're not a Demoknight, consider that it can be a replacement for buying canteens to get your heads as well as the fact you can switch to your stickybomb launcher and place a crit-sticky, but the price of it means you might as well buy resistances instead. For Demoknights, this helps you kill far more effectively, especially with swing speed.
• Attack Speed - While the bonus is small, it's cheaper than boosting damage or crits-on-kill, and helps with taking down tanks. Together with a damage bonus, tanks don't stand a chance. For Demoknights, like the other upgrades here, it's worth it.
• Health on Kill - You get health on kill anyway, but this health-on-kill can overheal you. It's also dirt cheap. Non-demoknights with the Eyelander should probably pass this up, but Demoknights can dive right in. Especially good with crits-on-kill so your killing spree can keep going on.

Scotsman's Skullcutter Demoknight-inclined weapon

Unless the system of bonuses-on-bonuses is somewhat off, a fully damage-boosted Skullcutter (at a cost of 1,600 credits) will do 156 damage a time. That's 468 damage on a crit. Then, with attack speed on max for 800 credits, a 40% attack bonus makes this a tank-peeler extraordinaire. Slower speed can be covered with upgrades, but compared to many other Demoknight weapons, this is somewhat lacking. You don't collect heads giving you more health and speed, you don't heal all your health on a kill, and so on.

• Damage (Demoknight only) - One-hit weaker bots, but this is expensive. Get your speed back and some resistances first.
• Crits on Kill - Great for a high-damage weapon, though a little expensive.
• Attack Speed - Either wait for a tank or get another upgrade first to see its full potential. Attack speed on its own is only a fairly mild bonus.
• Health on Kill - Kills are fairly likely with this weapon, and the cheap cost makes it a good idea for Demoknights.

Engineer

Frontier Justice

The usual weakness of the Frontier Justice can easily be covered, and with all the crits you're sure to build up, it can be powerful indeed.

• Ammo Capacity - Engineers don't usually have a problem with ammo, so unless you're going for prolonged use, you can pass this up.
• Clip Size - Now we're talking. You could potentially hit 9 shells a clip. 9 crits in a row... That's effective.
• Fire Rate - Useful to get more crits in before you have to retreat, but +10% a time is fairly minor.
• Reload Rate - Shotguns are moderately paced in reloading, but speeding it up is particularly useful with the Frontier Justice for your little rampages.
• Projectile Penetration - What better to go with your crit? Let that crit hit lots of things! As bots tend to group together this is particularly powerful. It only costs 200 credits, too, so it's worth getting.
• Health on Kill - The Engineer's health is a major limiting factor in rampages, and you could score a lot of kills. So long as you keep close enough to ensure those hits, you could keep on going with this, provided it's boosted high enough.

Widowmaker

The Widowmaker is awesome for rampages. Use it with a Kritz Canteen or Medic and squish armies of bots. Additionally, it doesn't cost much to upgrade it a long way because half the upgrades affecting it are passive Engineer-wide upgrades which are handy for other uses. Great if you're low on credits consistently.

• Fire Rate - Because there's no need to reload, boosting Fire Rate is very effective, and makes better use of crits.
• Projectile Penetration - If you're using crits on this, you might as well. If you're not, it's still fairly useful, but not essential.
• Health on Kill - Because you can't boost its damage, you may not score many kills. As such, this isn't great.

• Max Metal Capacity - While a passive thing, it's still good to upgrade it with the Widowmaker to keep on firing for longer.
• Metal per 5 seconds - If you make a slight to moderate net loss of ammo when firing, getting this passive bonus is handy to cover it.

Pistol

You can utilise the Engineer's pratically infinite ammo pool very pratically here.

• Clip Size - A good bonus, but pretty costly as secondary weapon upgrades go. Still, if you use it a lot, reloading less often and damaging more is a good thing.
• Projectile Penetration - As a long-ranged weapon, this is handy, and you only need to buy this upgrade once. Great with a crit canteen.
• Health on Kill - Less useful, as this isn't much of a finisher.
• Firing Speed - Best once you've got Clip Size and Projectile Penetration. Now, you'll be able to do plenty of damage to lots of robots. Be sure you're not neglecting other more useful upgrades at this stage though.

Wrangler

Incredibly powerful as you stay away from many threats to the Sentry, while still scoring lots of kills. Keep an eye on your Sentry ammo though, you may need your dispenser nearby.

The Wrangler can't be upgraded, but Sentry upgrades will help.

Short Circuit

For higher-end Engineers, this is great for countering Demospam so long as you have a decent metal supply. But, what'dya know, there's metal buffs! Suddenly, this weapon can be spammed in support of your team.

• Fire Rate - Better for spam usage, but unless you're going to use this heavily, you may want to use your 100 credits for something more useful.
• Health on Kill - This made me laugh when I saw it. For total hardcore players, perhaps? Don't use it.

Eureka Effect

Useful for covering the costs of a respawn canteen, but that only costs 10 credits. Plus, you have a dual-teleporter unlockable ability which is just as good. Plus, the inability to move buildings will make Sentry Busters a whole lot worse for you.

• Fire Rate - Useful for faster repair, even if the bonus is mild.
• Health on Kill - You won't make many wrench kills, so don't bother.

Southern Hospitality

Pyros are a bigger threat than normal, so keep that in mind for the fire vunerability. However, just 150 credits can more than cover that problem with fire defence. Though, as Spies are less frequent and fewer opportunities for melee present themselves, this may be one Wrench to pass up.

• Attack Speed - Because bleed doesn't stack, it's not any more useful damage-wise than any other melee weapon. However, as a Wrench, this is highly useful anyway, as you can repair faster. But you could do that with any other Wrench.
• Health on Kill - While the SH is more likely to score a kill than other Wrenches, it's not really worth spending the credits on a situational weapon like that.

PDA Abilities

You'll probably spend most of your points here. There's a nice range of abilities to choose from.

• Disposable Sentry - Dies very quickly but often manages a kill. Alright if you've got the Frontier Justice and you're keeping your main Sentry alive, but 500 credits sure is expensive. It could also be useful alongside the Wrangler to prevent lighter bots getting you when you're focused on Wrangler-shooting the heavier ones.
• Building Health - Powerful as an ability. With it, only an outright targeted systematic attack on your buildings can take them out (like a mob of Demomen or a Sentry Buster.) Less useful with the Wrangler, but will be vital sooner or later.
• Sentry Firing Rate - The problem with this one is the high credit cost, and the increased need to stay at your Sentry and keep maitaining it. Goes well with a higher metal cap.
• Max Metal - Great if your buildings are a bigger target that you, and works mighty-fine with the Wrangler.
• 2-way Teleporters - Very handy for pulling back, defences and countering accidental teleports. Generally, it's a good idea to grab this at a point where Scouts are likely to grab the bomb, so you can head back through the teleporter and stop them.
• Dispenser Range - Requires a fair bit of experimentation. If done correctly, you can utilise this to heal round corners and keep the dispenser safe from harm. This is very effective for minimising Sentry Buster damage or helping heavier classes gain a slight bit of manuverability.

Medic

Crusader's Crossbow

You can do a lot of cool things you wouldn't do usually with this weapon. Fully upgraded, it's probably more effective than the other Syringe guns.

• Projectile Penetration - When this was added by the Crossbow, this changed from a decent long-ranged weapon for when you're not pocketing to a super-bot-killing-ally-healing Epic Syringe Gun. Get it immediately, and you'll quickly see its benefits. As the Crossbow has reverse drop-off, you can hit through one opponent, hit another and hit another with progressively higher damage. Also, you can heal an opponent and hurt an enemy in one bolt - great for long-distance healing someone meleeing a tank.
• Clip Size - Costly but is quite awesome due to the damage output you could be dealing. Remember, though, the Crossbow is better at long ranges, so if you're in the midst of battle, it's a little weak.
• Ammo Capacity - The Crossbow has an ample amount of ammo, more than you'll probably need. You don't really need to boost this unless it becomes a major problem.
• Reload Rate - While it reloads fast anyway, it's not clip-based, so if you've boosted the clip size, the reload rate might get in the way. Otherwise, you may not need to do this. An alternative is to ignore boosting the clip size and rely on reload and fire rate to rapid-fire.
• Fire Rate - Quite useful if you've boosted the clip size, useless without. With a boosted clip, its fire rate is quite poor so it's worth boosting it, so long as you're not neglecting your medigun.
• Health on Kill - Its burst damage makes it a fairly decent finishing weapon, but as the Medic regenerates health anyway, and you'll be away from combat if you're using this to its full potential, it's kinda up for debate.

Overdose

Because of its plain downside, you can make up for it by boosting its fire rate. However, you can boost Medic speed anyway so the main upgrade is fairly redundant, and with all the fire your team is taking, you will mostly be pulling out this weapon in self-defence.

• Fire Rate - Useful to cover the weapon's downside, but the money may be better spent on medigun upgrades, unless your main problem is the tanks. If so, take this with an ammo capactity and/or clip boost.
• Clip Size - Against tanks, this is mildly useful, but the damage reduction makes this less effective.
• Health on Kill - Better for the self-defence usage of the gun, but useless when you're dealing with an unguarded tank.
• Ammo Capacity - Probably the most useful one for the Overdose, if you're going for prolonged attacks on the Tank, this works well.

Medi Gun

Despite Invunerability being great for distracting a crowd of robots, its low Uber rate means it's likely to go to waste.

• Share Power-ups - Generally not a good idea with the stock because of its high cash cost and the fact the canteens will generally give you no special effect. Using the Uber canteen between regular Ubers could work, but it still leaves you vunerable inbetween.
• Heal Rate - Helpful for lasting that little bit longer for pockets, this is a handy little bonus for when you have multiple heal targets. However, it's hard to heal multiple targets through a crowd of robots.
• Ubercharge Rate - Highly useful to cover the slow Uber rate, but expensive too. You may be upgrading this at the expense of survivability boosts, so be careful!
• Ubercharge Duration - Seeing as you can quickly pop an Uber at the start of each round, this is quite useful. This works better for Heavies and Pyros (as the extra time won't be wasted reloading) or later on when other classes have high clip sizes. As a whole, don't go for this first.
• Overheal limit - Lasting longer is a good thing, but overdoing this boost may lead to the problem of you getting killed a lot, as your teammates make ever-more daring pushes their poor Medic can't survive. Less useful if there's another Medic in your team.
• Overheal duration - Again, less useful if there's another Medic at the team. Stacks well with Overheal limit. Just top all the players off at the start of the match and when you can - your overheal can continue to help teammates for longer if you're dead or otherwise unavalible. Helpful if you keep getting killed.

Kritzkrieg

Probably more useful than the Medi Gun due to higher-health enemies where high damage hits wouldn't be wasteful and the fact the Medi Gun works best for busting defences (which the bots don't have). Also, the fact it charges faster is helpful for someone so squishy. Finally, you can kritz an Engie for faster Sentry fire rate (2 engies, one with a Wrangler, the other repairing the Sentry, and a Kritz Medic? Ouch!)

• Share Power-ups - Works much better for the Kritz. Use the Uber one while you're deploying Kritz. The Uber canister's also slightly cheaper than the Critical one.
• Heal Rate - Seeing as you have a weaker defence with the Kritz, it's a decent move. You'll may want to pocket more as usually only one or two players make good Kritz candidates.
• Ubercharge Rate - Kritz spam, anyone? Well, the key problem here is spending cash you would better spend on survival things like Heal Rate, which is more important to the Kritz than Stock.
• Overheal limit -A handy thing to have anyway. Gives your pocket more staying power.
• Overheal duration - More of a team-thing. If you're pocketing, this is less useful.

Ubersaw

You won't be meleeing much in MvM, but there are some slight niche uses. For one, bot Snipers are completely blind to their surroundings, so you can kill one for easy Uber. Uber-on-hit doesn't work on tanks, though, and it's usually foolish using melee in self-defence in MvM.

• Attack Speed - Cover a downside, but this is expensive and not really worth it. You're not going to use your Ubersaw much.
• Health on Kill - Again, not really worth it.

Sniper

Huntsman

Projectile penetration, damage and bleed makes the Huntsman fairly powerful even in unskilled hands.

• Damage - Great for when you just miss the headshot, or when headshotting giants. Get Projectile Penetration first for maximum effect.
• Projectile Penetration - Picks off hordes of bots effectively as the Huntsman doesn't have damage drop-off.
• Explosive Headshot - Projectile Penetration means you may not be needing to headshot as much as normal, and scoring a headshot with the Huntsman is arguably harder than with a normal Sniper Rifle. Depends on your skill, really.
• Bleed - Great if you're quick on the draw and take off lone Scouts or something who slip past your defenses, or just as an extra damage bonus. Higher tiers of this are progressively less useful, however, as it's based on time rather than damage.
• Ammo Capacity - Very important due to the Huntsman's low ammo capacity. Get this, quick.