[Powerlord]

Originally Posted by Horsedick Doesn't the Cowmangler counter that for about 4 seconds thus plenty of time for it to be destroyed if a "team" is working together?

It disables the sentry, but doesn't remove the Wrangler shield. And the damn thing takes 8 stickies to kill while wrangled.

No, the easiest way to kill a Wrangled gun is to kill the Engineer and wait 3 seconds, and the Engy would likely jump down if he thought he'd die (because he likely has a teleporter up there, so if you don't kill it...)

[Horsedick]

Originally Posted by Powerlord It disables the sentry, but doesn't remove the Wrangler shield. And the damn thing takes 8 stickies to kill while wrangled. No, the easiest way to kill a Wrangled gun is to kill the Engineer and wait 3 seconds, and the Engy would likely jump down if he thought he'd die (because he likely has a teleporter up there, so if you don't kill it...)

Yeah I think what I'm driving at here is there is a way it seems to counter everything already in the game with a few exceptions that valve has yet to address and that is the damn dead ringer and phlog. Dead ringer just takes way too much to kill a spy IMO and the Phlog is just a damn over powered pc of you know what that has turned non playing pyro players into nothing but that.

[Powerlord]

Originally Posted by Horsedick Yeah I think what I'm driving at here is there is a way it seems to counter everything already in the game with a few exceptions that valve has yet to address and that is the damn dead ringer and phlog. Dead ringer just takes way too much to kill a spy IMO and the Phlog is just a damn over powered pc of you know what that has turned non playing pyro players into nothing but that.

The DR's damage resistance makes sense for the purpose for which it was created, which was to allow Spies to get through areas that have a lot of gunfire, such as the area between BLU spawn and point A of Dustbowl stage 3. The nerfs it has gotten were much needed (i.e. the cap on how much cloak an ammo box gives you, plus the damage resistance ending after 6.5 seconds regardless of how much cloak is left). The DR also has the Pomson as a direct counter, as one hit from it drains 80% cloak (no, I'm serious) if TF2Fix isn't installed. The various other status effects also let you know exactly where the Spy is (fire, bleed, jarate, milk, water)... and he still dies fairly quickly from Axtinguisher hits.

The Phlog eliminates the Pyro's primary defense versus Soldiers and Demomen, plus it got nerfed to do less damage than the standard flamethrower. The damage resistance plus healing when activated seems a little OP at the moment... I wouldn't be surprised if one of the two gets nerfed. It is interesting that the damage resistance doesn't apply to backstabs, though... does anyone know if it applies to headshots?

The Wrangler makes a sentry do three times the damage and have 3 times the defense, plus it allows the Engy to rocket jump. Its only downside is that it no longer auto-aims, which makes it easier to kill the Engy instead of the gun. Seriously, the Wrangler needs to have its ability to rocket jump removed and it'd be just fine (although it could stand to have its defense lowered... seriously, a level 1 wrangled sentry can take as much damage as a level 3 non-wrangled sentry). As it is, Valve still hasn't gone back to nobuild roof areas on many maps, leading to sentries and teleporters in places that Engies were never meant to build on maps that were created before Engies could sentry jump. Of the 50+ maps in the game, cp_gorge is the only one Valve actually went back and fixed.

[Horsedick]

Originally Posted by Powerlord The Phlog eliminates the Pyro's primary defense versus Soldiers and Demomen, plus it got nerfed to do less damage than the standard flamethrower. The damage resistance plus healing when activated seems a little OP at the moment... I wouldn't be surprised if one of the two gets nerfed. It is interesting that the damage resistance doesn't apply to backstabs, though... does anyone know if it applies to headshots?

The Phlog doesn't matter if it does lose primary defense vs soldiers or demomen...they don't have a chance unless they are from a decent range way beyond what the thing is reaching which I think is too far. As a soldier if you are far away and can hit the pyro or near it to cause enough damage before it taunts which is another insane effect that pretty much allows it to "melt" anything remotely close. I really think two things need happen to this one alone, first off to reduce the range it has and the other is to reduce the melting factor by at least 30%.

Spy's abuse the DR with the stairs glitching allowing a major hit box disadvantage for any other player so something has to give. As for the Wrangler.. I think its fine the way it is and no I don't rocket jump with it but I don't believe in nerfing something that others can practice with and get good at over time, the DR and Phlog do not fall into this catagory.

[Messy Recipe]

Originally Posted by Thrawn2 howdy. i suggest using a func_nobuild for this. would be much cleaner as engineers can't even build on there anymore.

Ooh thanks, I'll definitely take a look at that method soon. I do quite like the explosion though, that + loss of some metal is a nice punishment for the engy.

Originally Posted by Horsedick I don't see it as an exploit... personally I think its cool if you can have the skill and take the time to get up there or any other spots for that matter that most can't get to. Much like first round of Gold rush where people jump up into upper levels and build before point is captured, it doesn't take a pro to remove them ubered in - skill matchs skill IMO but still nice plugin for I guess what it is worth.

We actually had a good deal of deliberation before deciding to ban it on our server. I was originally on the side of allowing the arch... it is very possible to take it down with a good uber.

Problem is that the way the pub matches usually play out, actually getting an uber once that thing is up is nearly impossible. It frees up the rest of RED to push out back to the first point instead of worrying about actually defending anything -- so unless they're abysmal players BLU pretty much can't win. It's very cramped out there and there are usually multiple pyros, so the medics either die or have to pop too early to be of use against the nest... and even if the uber gets in, said pyros plus sentry knockback tend to be an effective defense. And if you throw a kritz heavy or demo into the mix then BLU has no chance at all.

It's possible to hit the nest from just outside the one-way gate too, that spot is actually out of range, but all it takes to stop that is even more sentries covering that spot too. And that's if BLU can even get to the gate -- the sentry still covers the interior of the hallway leading to it.

Even if you can get in with an uber to attack it, filling it with buildings makes it so stickies don't stick to the top well, and the Wrangler makes it so you need pretty much all of them up there, which is unlikely to happen.

It became apparent that unless BLU was rolling through RED anyway, the way it usually went with a sentry up there was the BLU gets stalled out and all of RED save an engy or two comes out to crush them and push them back to spawn.

In organized play it's an entirely different story though -- in highlander for example, that arch is very vulnerable without a bunch of pyros and extra sentries.

[Dr. McKay]

UnhookEvent will throw an error if there is no active hook, so you can't call UnhookEvent without checking if there's an active hook.

[SmackDaddy]

Is this plugin usable as-is or does it need updated?

[Dr. McKay]

Originally Posted by SmackDaddy Is this plugin usable as-is or does it need updated?

It's usable, but will log an error on every map that's not cp_egypt (or the map that was changed to immediately after).

[SmackDaddy]

Originally Posted by Dr. McKay It's usable, but will log an error on every map that's not cp_egypt (or the map that was changed to immediately after).

Huge log file if egypt isn't voted on - got it. Thanks Dr. McKay.

[Messy Recipe]

Updated to fix the error log issue; now uses HookEventEx instead of HookEvent to track whether the hook has been created and only unhooks if the hook exists. Also improved / generalized the coordinates-checking code a bit.