So over the last few weeks our server performance has been deteriorating. We’ve had occasional problems with outages but they were pretty infrequent and between outages it worked fine. But lately the server has just been turning laggy anytime there were 15+ people on.
Over the weekend a tech said he’d tried various things, and I also tried some stuff like disabling the replay system and mods. I had to make a decision to re-up for another month on Sunday, and on Saturday night our game went off hitch free. So I thought we’d solved it. But then Monday night the server crapped out and was unplayably laggy again, so I guess not. So unless they manage to somehow figure out a way to fix it, we’ll be moving off to another service next month. I’ve already paid up for July though so hopefully the performance is adequate for now. I’m still trying to work with their tech support to come to some sort of resolution, but it seems like it’s something to do with the network at their data center.
We’re getting a really good deal on the server ($15/mo) which will probably get bumped up to $25 a month if we move, but oh well. It’s not worth it if we have to suffer through problems more and more frequently. I may try having them move our server to another data center - Chicago is the next best place for everyone on average and maybe that will help while allowing us to retain the price.
I’ll have to go back through my paypal history to see how much we’ve got for running the server vs our costs so far. I’ve had other transactions on there since then so it’s not just a matter of looking at my account total. I don’t think we’re going to be short anytime soon because my non-SDMB real life friends (red13nek and Adarmus) were very generous in donating $50 each to run the server.
So…I started playing when it went to F2P. I saw a post on Reddit that suggested playing Medic at first and I think I’ve at least started getting the hang of it. A few questions though. Playing as a support class, am I basically cannon fodder? I know Medics accumulate points through kill assists, but my kill K/D ratio always ends up 2/25 or something like that. Am I being too loyal to my “partner” and should hang back when they charge into battle, or is constantly being killed part of the job? Any other noob tips?
Well, you’ll get used to finding cover while continuing to cover your teammate and that’ll help. Try to keep your eyes open while healing; a medic-heavy combo is a tempting target for a spy and you can do a great job covering your heavy’s back. That bonesaw is pretty tough. And you know, you do get killed a bunch. To be fair, it’s a high-powered, twitchy game where even a dominant player gets killed every minute or so.
The real answer is that yes you are being too loyal. As a medic (true for every class, but moreso medic) you are more valuable alive than dead. If you charge into battle with one heal target, you both will die. This is all well and good for destroying a sentry nest with a demoman, but even then you can/should make it out alive.
You are more valuable giving your whole team heals so they can all go into combat with more health than the enemy.
OK. Kind of pisses me off sometimes. I’ll sit there healing a Heavy from behind cover, then he’ll just march on around the corner like he’s invincible. I’m forced to either go with him to my imminent demise, or duck back and forgo the Kill Assists he’s racking up.
Kill: Death:Assist ratio means pretty much nothing in the large picture of the game. As a medic, you will gain points for every 600 health healed anyways, so you’ll still be racking up the points as long as you’re alive and being useful. Should the game go long enough, you will end up very high on the scoreboard even if you didn’t get a single assist or kill simply from how much healing you did. Using an ubercharge will gain you a point as well, so staying alive and actually getting an ubercharge will be good as well.
EDIT: Let the Heavy go around the corner and die. If he’s good he’ll kill a person or two and come back to you when he’s damn near dead or he’ll retreat intelligently if the whole other team is around the corner. You should only really be charging into the other team head on when you have an ubercharge ready to go and you’ve made sure everyone going with you is nice and overhealed.
EDIT 2: An ideal Medic game will go like this: You heal up a group of your teammates and they go off into battle. While in battle you’re in the middle or back of the group healing everyone that was in battle before. Once they’re all healed up they go off into battle and the other wave comes back to you for their heals. Do this for 40ish seconds and you’ll have an ubercharge ready to go.
Medic Tutorial 1. This one has very good examples of using the ubercharge on more than one person. The player playing Medic in the videos has very good timing for keeping both targets ubered at once.
Tutorials 2. Pretty general and basic gameplay video of a medic running around giving whole team lots of heals, never sticking to any one player unless completely necessary. Also, good examples in there of letting a player go to their death when they get a little overconfident or just the circumstances turned out to be less favorable. You’d be dead too if you followed them too loyallay. Overheal someone and move on.
Don’t worry about ratios and all that, just try to be as useful as you can to the team. Don’t get locked onto one target - I see a lot of new medics continuously healing a heavy who’s at max health while another guy 5 feet away is at 20% health. Preserve your life - not only are you more useful if you can stay at the front lines and keep healing, but you have an ubercharge to worry about preserving too. Dying when you’re at 80% charge hurts your team more than just any other random death.
When in combat, see if you can heal your team from cover - if the geometry is right, you can hide behind a rock or a wall and still heal your teammates who are out firing at the enemy.
And only deploy your uber when you were either going to die anyway, or where it will make a real difference - like helping your teammates take down a sentry gun, or having your teammate able to mow down 4 enemies heading towards your capture point. Don’t just burn it as soon as you get it.
Also, you heal people at a faster rate the longer they’ve been out of combat - so a guy who ran back from the front lines at low health can be healed up to full very quickly. And the uber charging rate slows if your target is already at max overheal - so you’ll gain uber faster by healing people who need it rather than continuously healing one target at max.
The medic’s primary job is to stay alive. If you’re not sure if you can survive a situation, then get out. You need to stay alive to keep healing and to keep building ubercharge. The medigun is not an invulnerability beam and you will not be able to save people from nasty hits, so don’t play like you can. You’re triage, not armor. Ideally they know that too and play accordingly while also covering you from the major threats (scouts, mostly) but that’s where the teamwork bit of it comes in.
Oh god, the medic who adheres themself to me no matter what while I’m playing defence in 2Fort drives me crazy.
I’m a heavy, I’m slow. 2Fort is flagcap, you need to move fast. Get out there and keep our offense - the scouts and soldiers and demomen - alive. I’ll camp near the engie or linger around the healthpack spawns. The only time a medic should be attaching themself to me is if they need a meat shield to get them to where our offense boys are, and even then they need to tell me, because most of the time I’m guarding the spiral and long stairs, and I’m not going to run out onto the bridge just because they’ve overhealed me.
I’ll have to give medic another shot using the “hang back and heal everyone” mindset. I’ve found trying to stay on one person to be a frustrating experience in “pick up” games since generally no one seems interested in working as a team. Conversely, I’ve charred many a medic while the Heavy just stands there and fires off rounds into some target a half mile away
Compared to the first week, I’ve noticed a lot more cranky players these days. The usual “lol u sux”, “that weapon is for noobs and retards” and “stop playing spy if you’re going to just suck at it” stuff in general chat that I was expecting at first and surprised not to see. I’m not too worried about it, I figure if someone was so upset that they needed to rage about it in chat I’m already coming out ahead*, but I guess the honeymoon is over.
*I haven’t had anything yet directed at me specifically
I got the game with the Orange Box ages ago, but never really played it until last night–I was forcesinbalance, the utter noob with a slight pyromaniacal bent. I think I started picking up on some of the tactics as I went, but I really don’t know how much (or rather, how little) use I was. I’m still pretty vague on which class to use for which situation; unless it’s pretty obvious, my reasoning tends to be something like “I don’t know what to do, so I’m going to set things on fire.”
I don’t know if I’ll ever play it much, but it was fun as a change of pace, and at least I got to see some familiar names on the you-got-fragged cam.
I’m not the best player out there, but I humbly submit my video of me playing a medic: Little Geisha Boy. (Plus I could use the views. ;)) This is a full round of koth_nucleus, from setup to victory, with me surviving the whole time. I mostly stuck to one heavy, but I don’t hesitate to switch when necessary or even to run away when things get too hot.
I usually play pyro, who gets up close an personal; sometimes the best play, for example when preventing BLU from advancing the cart, is to do a kamikaze run and set everyone on the other team ablaze. Playing a medic requires a very different tactical mindset since you want to stay alive as long as possible.
See that’s my problem. I charge up my Uber then I’ll go with a Pyro on one of these runs, but sooner or later the Uber runs out and now I’m sitting there more or less defenseless with about 6 flaming baddies on top of me. I am getting a lot better with the Syringe Gun though. I’m only 1 achievement away from the first upgrade I think.
Don’t take Pyros unless you’re going for a sentry nest destruction. If you just have an uber ready and just need to make some sort of push on the other team take a demoman or heavy. Far more destructive power in those classes that will definitely have people evacuating. Part of the pyros benefits (and in this case, downsides) is that the point isn’t to burn someone completely to death, it’s to let them die from the flames later. Which doesn’t do a whole lot when ubered since most people can wait it out then kill you, while still on fire.
I am getting a lot better with the Syringe Gun though. I’m only 1 achievement away from the first upgrade I think.