Telefragging!

Well, I've been playing Team Fortress 2 for a year now, and as if to commemorate the occasion, something that's never happened to me before, happened today:



Yeah, a telefrag. I dunno if the poor enemy Engie was trying to melee it or something, all I know is that I killed him with my teleporter.
I've always wanted to do that.

And I'm seriously starting to love playing as the Scout. I've enjoyed playing on Turbine (which I previously regarded as completely shitty map), harassing enemies by being all over the place and snagging the intel while everyone was too busy handling the übered Heavy/Medic combo storming in and drawing sentry fire.

Please, dear Valve, give L4D a rest and update TF2 for a change.

I've also played lots of custom Payload maps lately (a Finnish server I find myself playing on these days has several PL customs in rotation) and I'm completely enamoured with both Half-Acre and Mill. Mill especially is wonderful, it's pretty well balanced throughout (although the first stage's last cap can easily get locked down by Engineers, BLU has a bit of a disadvantage because it's hard to form pushes through routes other than the one following the cart tracks) and very easy to look at. I love playing as Soldier and Demo there.
Payload version of Dustbowl is also great, although Demomen can lock the entire first stage down and it usually gets pretty ridiculous with both sides just chucking grenades at each other. I don't think I've ever even played on third stage.
And then again I fucking hate Great Heights (funny that it's got pretty high scores in FPSBanana), because the design is awful. RED has ridiculous advantage through the entire map from start to finish, starting with the horrible design of BLU spawn exits right at the start of the map. And I hate it that there's no collision on the edges of the map, but that might be just me, since Slaver finds nothing wrong with it (he hates the map too, ftr).
The first time I saw second stage I found it admirable that someone had actually used some water (there's this water part in the map, you have to actually escort the cart through the water, which I think is a pretty interesting idea in theory) and was then horribly disappointed because it doesn't work in practice at all. It just gets ridiculously spammy since you can't see into the water OR out of the water. It's a tedious spot in which neither of the teams know what's really happening. It might work if pulled off differently, it's just ... well, personally, and from the viewpoint of someone who has actually done some map designing before, I think the design is sloppy at best. Some great ideas here and there, they just haven't been pulled off very well. I'm not saying that I can do better, we'll just have to see about that. Haha.
So I just usually disconnect when Great Heights comes along, or decide to be an annoying nade-spamming Demo.
I also kinda like CP Freight. It's not that great, it's just ... well, it's like Fastlane. I don't know what makes it so fun to play, I just like playing a game or two there every once in a while.

Speaking of maps, me and Slaver are probably starting to work on our own custom TF2 CP map any day now. My PC can finally run Hammer without choking and dying, so all we gotta do now is sit down and brainstorm the initial design down.

Ahhh and why do I always forget to write about the things that I should? I played the F.E.A.R. 2 Project Origin demo a couple of days ago. It was pretty fun, although I found the controls a bit jarring and they still haven't gotten rid of the very basic problem that troubled the first game: it's too goddamned linear. First they spook you a little, then you shoot some bad guys, and then it's back to spooking, repeat ad nauseum. I was hoping the demo would prove that they'd gotten over that, but unfortunately it didn't really seem so.
It scared me a lot, though: the neverending ghost hallway almost gave me several heart attacks, and Slaver actually scared the crap outta me by making some noise with his door totally unexpectedly right in the middle of the intensive spooking part. Fuuuuuck I nearly died.
But I love the sound design! It really crates a creepy atmosphere and while it might seem a bit cluttered every now and then with the music and effects and your character's heartbeats or panting, it just adds to the feeling of urgency and anxiety. I think it's rather brilliant.
And the water effects look really nice!
But the goddamned mecha battle at the end of the demo? It was SO OUT THERE and unexpected I didn't know if I should laugh or facepalm or like it or hate it. It was ridiculous, yet somehow brilliant. I was just running at the bad guys, wondering whether I can STEP ON THEM and SQUASH THEM. I never found out because they died of bullets first.
I don't think I'll buy the game next month (the demo wasn't that much fun), but we'll see, since I really liked the first F.E.A.R. It was a chilling gaming experience even though it was painfully linear, and the action was lots of fun.

Celebrations!

There was a huge Left 4 Dead update just now and I can't stop feeling happy about it! So many changes to versus, Valve addressed basically all the problems I had with it, namely:

- Tank spawns at the same % through the map for both teams in versus mode

Hunter
- Easier to pounce a Survivor who is meleeing

Smoker
- Smoker now has to be killed or the tongue destroyed for the tongue to break
- Tongue attacks that fail to paralyze or hang a Survivor will use the shorter ability delay timer
- Fixed case where you could point at a Survivor but not register a tongue hit
- Smoker tongue does damage every second while dragging paralyzed Survivors

Tank
- Reduced autoshotgun damage against Tanks

So much for unfair Tanks! So much for getting frustrated at continuous meleeing as Hunter! So much for hating to play as the Smoker! I always hated being the Smoker, because I couldn't seem to be able to do SHIT as one. The tongue targeting was horrible, even if the aim indicator was red and the survivor in plain view, I couldn't score a hit. And if the drag failed, it was a bitch having to wait the minute or so for the attack to recharge and trying to change vantage points in plain sight. Dragging survivors long distances felt pointless at times since there was no damage until the drag was complete. Not even mentioning how frustrating the goddamn melee got. All that, fixed!
And autoshotgun was goddamn imbalanced GOD TIER against Tanks: they were dead in a course of seconds if you just ran behind them and unloaded a few clips into their oblivious backs from point-blank range. Yeah. I know it because I used to do it a lot in finales. The assault rifle is my weapon of choice, but whenever there was a Tank coming (and no one had a molotov) I changed to autoshotty and ran after Tanks while they were chasing some other team member. Yeah.

Too bad that I'm leaving for a family vacation today, and won't be able to play and enjoy the changes until some time next week.
Yeah, I would much rather stay at home playing videogames than go to Rome.

Kidding. I'll be off then.

P.S.: We finally completed two campaigns on expert. No achievements, though. Stupid cheat-proof achievements, we even restarted the campaigns once so that everyone saw the intro, but nooo, no one got Zombicidal Maniac or any progress to What Are You Trying to Prove. Sucks. But at least we did it once, we can surely do it again. We even completed Death Toll without restarting even once. That was pretty impressive.

Well that's pretty gay...

Okay, I just have to post this. Because wtf awesome.

I was playing a bit of Fallout 3 earlier today. I started a new game a while ago, this time with a guy named Gabrielle, who's strong and charismatic fellow (specialised in big guns, melee weapons and bullshitting like no other), who likes to dress sharp. And incidentally he's a complete antichrist and a shameless thief who takes everything not nailed down with him. He runs around the Capital Wasteland dressed in a stylish suit, hat and sunglasses, wielding a sledgehammer and a Flamer (although I just found the joys of the Shishkebab). He sneers at ugly Raider clothing and doesn't give a shit about defense stats: sacrifices must be made if one wants to look as good as Gabrielle does.



(Posing with a cool-ass magnum, since the Flamer's so clumsy-looking, ew.)

Anyway, Gabrielle blew up Megaton, went to Tenpenny Tower, felt appalled by all the bloated egos and ignorant people living there, and instead of maybe helping them with their Ghoul menace, he promptly went to talk to the Ghouls in question, ending up in cahoots with them. Because no matter how hard I try, Ghouls are awesome, and seriously, the racist residents of Tenpenny Tower needed to be taught a lesson in humility.

So before actually letting the Ghouls in, he went to look for Burke, since Gabrielle happens to be a bit of a Burke fanboy, and he wanted to get a picture with his idol. So he went to the penthouse suites, and followed Burke around for a while to get a good picture.

So picture his surprise (and my sick glee) when he followed Burke into Alistair Tenpenny's suite and witnessed THIS sight:



Yes.

Yes, Mr. Burke just promptly laid down next to Alistair Tenpenny in his queen-sized bed (I knew there was something going on...!), and neither of them paid any attention to Gabrielle standing (...and later on sitting...) next to the bed.

Gabrielle of course was mortified by this: either appalled or enormously jealous, he couldn't stand the sight of his idol being so ... so close with Mr. Tenpenny. So he went to let the Ghouls in, watched everyone get massacred and stole Mr. Tenpenny's fancy red suit.

The end.

(I fucking love this game.)

Wb, me!

Guess who's back in the game.



And as you can see, the new PC handles L4D pretty nicely, the resolution alone is pretty insane (yes, I am playing with 1280x1024 and near-highest graphics settings, and it runs as smoothly as it possibly can). For now I'd say getting this PC was worth the while.
L4D seems to be pretty light either way, back when I played the Demo on my old PC, the game actually ran pretty nicely. I mean, I wasn't even playing on the lowest graphics settings - at least texture detail was high - but my resolution was 640 x 480 (this is how it looked, yay PSOne graphics ftw!), and I got all the lighting effects, and actually a pretty decent FPS. And I had been quite sure that the computer would refuse to run it in the first place.

So how about Team Fortress 2?
FPS stays on green almost in every situation (saw it flicker in yellow when there was dozens of stuff on the screen at once), and I get about the same graphics as I did playing on little brother's computer last summer.
So all in all? I'm pretty much extremely satisfied.

I have much to do, organizing files, installing stuff and so forth, so I'll leave a more in-depth entry about Left 4 Dead for later, for now I'll just say that I love versus. I got to play some bits of the co-op campaign on a friend's PC last week after the game came out, so I was somewhat familiar with it, and last night the first thing we did after I got the game, was to find a server and play some versus. I had played it once before, and the game whined to me about needing to play the campaign first, but I didn't really care.
And yes yes the best part about versus is getting to play as the Infected. The best part about playing as the Infected is spawning as the Tank. Okay, yeah, I can't really say since I was a Tank for about ten seconds last night. I spawned at the end of No Mercy just as the Survivors were stumbling to the evac helicopter. I managed to incap one of them, though, so job well done, and only one escaped alive, as rest of my Infected buddies managed to pin the others down. (Yeah, I'm the Tank in the screenshot I posted.)
I like being other Infected as well, Smoker's probably my favourite since you don't have to go get so intimate with the Survivors as the Smoker. I like lurking about rooftops. Hunter's fun as well, although I seem to be just horrible at aiming my jumps, haha. But I've had my best ownage moments as a Hunter pinning down a lone Survivor while others are being harrassed by a Boomer and subsequently a horde. Oh, love. Boomer's surprisingly fun as well.

What sucks about versus is the crazy console-reminiscent lobby system that absolutely sucks because you don't know what kind of ping you'll have until you're actually in game. So it's mostly just jumping from one server to another until one with not-as-crazy latency comes along.
Or since I usually have at least three buddies to play with at any given time, we make a server of our own and then search for a dedicated one, which seems to work pretty well. We get nice ping, and the server usually fills up quickly.
And then we get our fair share of idiots: one of my buddies was playing versus for the first time last night, so of course one of our team-mates started whining at him that he sucks, but. Me and Slaver kindly told him to stfu, and he still had the nerve to start a votekick against my friend. Which backfired royally, because after that there was a vote to kick the whiner, which - needless to say - passed 3 to 1.
I can only imagine how much he must've been raging, hee hee.
But just what the fucking hell, you choose a random public server and then start whining about the noobs? Besides, dear idiot, you weren't doing too hot either (I was kicking your ass in scores and I was playing for the second time), so please do take a look in the mirror before mouthing off a "noob."
Yeah yeah, I know, the whole teamwork thing, of course it sucks if someone on your team seems to be lost, but ffs you can still treat the player nicely and try to understand that the game's been out for a week and not everyone can be fucking brilliant at it already.

But yeah, it's like fighting windmills, fighting these idiots in online multiplayer communities.

Well, I've never been this happy about being wrong before...

Okay, I was completely ready to squee over Meet the Sandvich and talk about Companion Cube Soccer since I was quite sure that the update won't come tonight, but SORRY, I WAS WRONG.

So at least I know what I'll be doing for the rest of the night. LUMBERYARD, STEEL, BADWATER BASIN, HERE I COME.

Expect a freaking massive entry tomorrow.

Oh, Soldier...

Forget everything I whined about the Soldier, turns out I can still play as one, and do pretty good. Yeah, sure, I suicide more often than not if a Pyro charges right at me, and it pisses me off, but... oh well. At least I'm somewhat more conscious about Pyros now.
Also did probably the most awesome kill I've ever done on Badlands. There was an enemy Demo trying to cap their spire back, and I was just getting out of respawn. So just before the point was capped, I rocketjumped from the ledge, fired a rocket at the Demo while I was still airborne, and landed right in the middle of the cap point just as the Demo exploded into gibs. And I got a domination out of it, because I had killed the player before while he was still playing as a Spy. I'd love to show you a screenshot, but my F5-fu was too slow and I only got a screenshot in which I've already landed and there are giblets everywhere. Besides, the said screenshot is on my little brother's computer. But I'll show it to you once I get my hands on it.
Anyway, I just couldn't stop grinning after that. And a mere moment later the round ended, we won, and I was the number one MVP.
So much about not being able to play as Soldier anymore. Sorry about whining, Soldier, I think I still love you, even with all the nerfing and everything.
I should learn to use the shotgun, though. I don't know why I can use the shotgun as a Pyro, no problem, but as a Soldier I use the shotgun very rarely, if ever.
And godDAMN I hate skilled Pyros who can already use the airburst like it's always been there.

I also got the Flare Gun for Pyro (I got Weenie Roast, Fire and Forget, Spontaneous Combustion and Firewatch since the last time I wrote), but it doesn't really matter because I like the shotgun so much more, and I'm not going to give it up. Besides, I have a horrible aim, I'm laggy, and I have hard time hitting distant moving targets even as a Soldier, so I probably wouldn't even hit anything with the Flare Gun.

And finally I have hands-on impressions about the Kritzkrieg and the Übersaw.
Kritzkrieg is... well, I'll just have to learn to use it. And find people who I can give the charge to without them just rushing out guns blazing and thinking that they're still invulnerable (which is what I usually do when I'm kritzkrieged...). And I felt pretty stupid kritzkrieging a Backburner-equipped Pyro, but at least the havoc we caused was formidable.
And naturally there was some Heavy player yelling for Medic and after seeing that I was holding the Kritzkrieg, he started whining how Kritzkrieg is completely useless, hey Medic change it to normal medigun, and goddamn I raged. "Your ass is useless," I wanted to say. Don't fucking question what I'm doing. I think I'm a pretty good Medic (and at least the stats don't argue against me: yesterday, whenever I was a Medic, I was on top of the scoreboard. No exceptions.), and I dare to claim that I know what our team needs and when we need it. We were in Granary, pushing for the last point (oh I wonder how we managed to get to the last point with just the "useless" Kritzkrieg! Shut the fuck up if you don't know what I can do, and you weren't there to see how me and a Pyro cleared the entire warehouse a couple of times and capped the point), and yes, there was a sentry, but everyone knows that all it takes is a Demoman or a Soldier to take down any sentries near the last point (if I can do it, any Soldier with half a skill can do it!). There is no need for the regular über: the Kritzkrieg, if used well, can make more of a difference by killing every single player guarding the point, after which the sentry is left unattended.
So if you get killed just because I didn't have the über to give to you, fuck off. What makes you think I would've übered you anyhow? Heavies are useless against tanked sentries in the distance, I would've much rather picked a Demoman to do the job.

But yeah, I totally admit that Kritzkrieg is useless in some situations. When there are a lot of sentries (I wouldn't use the Kritzkrieg if we're attacking on Dustbowl - at least), sure, I'd pick the regular medigun. You just have to know when and how to use it. Which I'm planning to learn. And it's not that I can't change weapons during respawn if the situation changes so that it isn't favourable to use the Kritzkrieg anymore. And I think a team with two Medics one of which is holding the Kritzkrieg and the other the regular medigun, can be extremely successful.

And the Übersaw? Less-than-three. I tend to forget all the time that hitting with it once charges the übercharge meter by 25%, so I was mighty surprised after killing a Spy with it and then sporting a full charge, even after I had just übered a mere moment ago. Lolwut. I might have to learn to melée a bit better, I usually attack with the Blutsauger. Which keeps even those monstrous Pyros at bay and it's wonderful. <3

I even got a max übercharges record yesterday; managed to stay alive during an entire Gravel Pit round (if my team can hold B, I can usually stay alive for the entire round - and keep most of my team alive as well) and launched five übers during that time. I have to thank our Engineers for that, though, a dispenser on the point saved my life so many times (since I was the only Medic in the team). Damn flame damage drop-off removal. Nothing's more awesome than seeing your life drop close to zero and reaching a dispenser when it's down to six or so. Ehh.

And people, if you got headshot yesterday by me and I was doing the kukri taunt in the deathcam, it was not me. Little brother was on a roll in Granary, and taunted after every single kill he got. He even had the nerve to do it while in flames and about to die. I know I'd be raging my head off: I hate good Snipers, and I hate it when people taunt after they've killed me.
But seeing someone else ("me") do it, was priceless. I was laughing my ass off. And the kukri taunt is so priceless, oh god... I hope people at least got nice deathcam shots outta those taunts.
The only thing I'm trying to stop my little brother from doing, is using teleporters. He seems to be a compulsive teleport-user, whenever he sees one, he just gets on it and I try to stop him because for fuck's sake, Snipers don't use teleporters. D:
And since no one knows that Sniper-Chrome is not me, well... everyone must think that I'm an asshole Sniper. Yay? Maybe I should get him to change his nick when he's playing (I would've made him do it already, but I can't remember the console command, and I never remember to look it up). To avoid confusion. And to stop people from thinking that I'm a complete asshole and actually a pretty good Sniper (he was called a "monster" a few days ago and told to GTFO of the "newbie" server. The whiner probably wasn't a regular...).

Well, that was easy

Look!


That was ridiculously easy.

Heh, I'm once again playing drunk.

I went Medic a few times, just to see if I could get any of the achievements. And it would seem that the Blutsauger is ridiculously easy to get. I got those twelve achievements without even trying. This far I have First Do No Harm (I had three other Medics in my team, but luckily they all sucked, so I got it pretty damn easily on Dustbowl), Quadruple Bypass, Group Health (without coordinating: like I told you, it would be easy to get, what with all servers being full of Medics), Surgical Prep, Trauma Queen (I have no idea how I got this, I don't even remember staying alive for three consecutive übers - yeah, I AM drunk), Double Blind Trial (easy as heck), Play Doctor (sheer luck, I changed to Medic in the middle of a match in Goldrush and got it just like that), Triage, Autoclave (apparently you don't have to kill five people, it's enough to just light them on fire, at least that's how I got it), Midwife Crisis (the first one I got, very easy), Bedside Manner (I was sneaky: I kept healing a Medic who just joined the server during the setup: he got Surgical Prep, I got this) and Chief of Staff.

So. I have a Blutsauger.

AWESOME.

And now I'll jump on a server for a moment to test my brand new pretty Blutsauger. <3 Didn't have time to actually test it, I'm keeping a cigarette break from playing. I'll try to get the rest of the achievements later. I really want to get the Kritzkrieg (got Kritzkrieged a few times today, again, and it was so GODDAMN AWESOME every single time. Fucking hell...). Slaverstrike already promised to help me to get it, so I'm looking forward to it.

BLUTSAUGER FUCK YEAH.

EDIT: I just got Ubi concordia, ibi victoria. WUT. I was sure that's one of the achievements that I wouldn't be getting in quite some time, but well, whaddaya know. I was steamrolling in Granary again (...why am I this good when I'm drunk, seriously?), got the achievement when I was capping the last point with a kickass Demoman. And I'm apparently already 50/200 through Grand Rounds.
Also, Second Opinion is indeed impossible to get. It's apparently very buggy, I've been trying to juggle my übers the whole night, but I still don't have the achievement.

Jesus Christ I RAGED last night in Dustbowl.
I was playing in RED, having tons of fun defending and healing people and pushing BLU back into their spawn in Stage Three. And then.
Autobalanced.
I RAGED because, well, I figured I'd end up being pushed back into spawn continuously because that's what RED was doing to BLU. Dominating like whoa. I even thought of going spectator until there's room in RED again, but I didn't want to be a spoilsport, so I just swallowed all the silly rage and started healing people I had been (assisting in) killing before. I'm a good Medic, dammit, I can tip the scales if I really try! We can win this shit!

Except that I don't ever remember having as broken a team. I think we had couple of AFK players, but seriously, I was up there, trying to heal another Medic, an odd Soldier and an Engineer. Those were the only fucking people I saw. And I went back to the spawn to find more people when everyone else died and no, there was no one there. And according to the scoreboard we had a full 12 player team.
Anyway, apparently all the "good" players had left after Stage Two (after all, BLU had got through the first two stages), and, well, I was on top of the scoreboard, and had twice as much points as the next player, 'nuff said.
So I RAGED again. And this time I was so angry that I actually yelled at them. I was just so fucking angry at being switched into such a sorry excuse for a team. Once again I wanted to switch to spectator and go back to my old team, I had friends there and we were doing so well and having fun and...
I don't know if my raging actually made them start working harder or what the hell happened, but suddenly there were a couple of Demos and a Heavy and we pushed the defenders back so that I could build my über without dying and not long after that we capped the first point. We never got the last one, but I actually had fun after the first cap. The team had miraculously pulled itself together! It was great! I felt sorry that I had raged and told the team that they were awesome after all. Because they were, after they regained their composure.
And yeah, I was doing very well for a change, in the end of the round I even had more points than the enemy team's highest scoring player (...and still almost twice as much as the rest of my team...) and yay, I don't actually remember ever being the one with the best score out of all players. I would've got the achievement out of that (except that I think I killed one Spy).
But yeah, this is just one more example how I should never switch back to my old team after autobalance. No matter how bad the things are looking, I can end up having more fun than I otherwise would've had.

I was also steamrolling with Slaverstrike on Well. Again. Look at us, topping the scoreboard.


Was awesome. So awesome. We make good team.

I also Engineered a bit on Dustbowl. Got myself a brand new best score, 18 points, and kills record too. 12 from a sentry, and two shotgun kills, those silly Spies. And I felt like a good person after seeing a comrade being blown into smithereens while his sentry was under über-Heavy fire, and rushing in and keeping the friendly sentry alive.
Also did some experimental engineering on 2fort (because that's what 2fort is for, I hate it so much). And I had this extremely silly Spy trying to cause me grief. Just ended up causing me to giggle uncontrollably. Damn idiot stabbed me TWICE when I was tanking behind my sentry. Well you know how that ended up. Not very well on the poor Spy's part. The first one I understand, because hey, it happens. But after the second time I was having hard time trying to recover from a giggle fit. And later on I dominated the poor sod, and of course did it very gracefully by getting shot to death by my own sentry at the same time. The Spy died from the same goddamn rocket, and I hear the pompous DOMINATION soundclip and see my sentry looking preeetty good (that's my baby <3). What's more, I got a defense out of it, because the Spy was carrying our intel. Nice combo. A kill, a domination, a defense, and yet another deathcam shot of my own sentry.

And actually, right now I'm hoping that the update won't come until the end of the week. Because I have lots of school stuff to do and I don't know if I have the guts to actually sacrifice our project for an insane Goldrush allnighter.
Don't fail me, Valve.

SAWRY!

I could talk about Meet the Scout, but, uh. I liked it, but was kinda disappointed because it wasn't nearly as funny as the other Meet the Team videos (my favourite's probably Meet the Soldier). And I felt sorry for the Heavy, the poor guy just wanted a sammich.
Also my Scout hate is bordering serious nerd RAGE because yesterday I was getting dominated by some badass Scouts. Seriously there's nothing I hate more than a good Scout.
And those fuckers always crit when they shoot me. Even today I was killed three times by a goddamn Scout getting a scattergun crit. Stupid Scouts.


(But I can't help it: he is kinda cute. In some really obnoxious way.)

ANY DAY NOW. The update. Could be today, could be tomorrow, eeee, I'm just hoping it won't take forever.

Anyway, back to our usual schedule of wanton babbling:

I had the most awesome match ever in CTF Well a few days ago. Everyone, and I mean everyone went melée. It's never really happened before in my presence (on the servers I usually play on), some go melée and the rest keep playing normally, and it's really not fair, but that's how it goes. Some people don't have a sense of humour. Anyway, this time everyone went melée. 24 players.
I was Medic because, you know, I'm having the Strictly Medic week. And I was actually doing better than I imagined! Even broke my kills record!
And everyone had fun as far as I know, because after the map changed and we found ourselves in Gravel Pit, everyone agreed to continue playing with melée weapons only. I charged cap A with the bonesaw in hand and still holding onto my über (I was playing in BLU). Felt a bit bad for wasting it completely (ie. never actually using it), but at least I was having so much fun. And we won the round, melée only.
I'm still a rotten combat Medic, though, but that was nice practice.

And we make a good team with Slaverstrike, we were steamrolling in CP Well at some point. He was a Soldier, I was a Medic, and in one life we capped two points, I gave him two übers and we were the round's MVPs. :3
I was also THIS close to übering an Engineer in 2fort, but damn it I died just as I right-clicked. Damn stupid something killed me. It would've been so awesome.

And today something happened that made me grin like an idiot for several minutes. I was playing Medic in Gravel Pit, and we were defending. We had somehow lost B, so I was pretty sure we would lose A too, and then battle it out over C. But as I went over to A, I saw we had a quite solid defense going on there. I was pretty much just running around and healing everyone rather than sticking to one person. And then the time's almost out, there's like 30 seconds left, and then BLU breaks through and goes to cap the point. I try to über someone who dies just before the charge kicks in, and there's NO ONE else around, so I just run away in the protection of the über and go get a medkit. There are about five people standing on the point, I wait for a second for someone to come, and much to my chagrin I notice that my entire team's apparently dead.
So I whip out the bonesaw and charge the goddamn point by myself. Luckily I crit, kill an Engineer before anyone even realises what's happening, and then proceed to waving the bonesaw around and reducing the entire group to half-dead state, and it takes them FOREVER to kill me.
I eventually die, but I'm grinning from ear to ear while waiting to respawn because that was probably the most awesome thing I've ever done. And I watch as my teammates arrive to the point a couple of seconds after my death and decimate the enemies, stopping the capture, and we won the round. If I hadn't been there to prevent the capture for the few seconds, BLU would've probably capped the point. And I was the number one MVP for the round. It really pays off to heal and buff EVERYONE.
The best part? My Medic screamed "MUST I DEFEND ZIS POINT BY MYSELF?!" and laughed like a maniac (I love Medic's laugh) when I charged in and killed the Engineer. AWESOME.
My best combat Medic moment ever.
I've actually never played a game in Gravel Pit so that only B is capped (a shutout I've seen, since I have the achievement). A is such a bitch to defend. But apparently it's possible. We had fuckloads of Engineers, though.

And after that we played in Dustbowl and after capping Stage One, the Heavy I was healing in the previous round tells me that I'm one of the best Medics he's seen on the server (he's a regular, I've been healing him maaany times before. IIRC he was the Heavy I was healing in Gravel Pit when our team was pretty lost and the guy who played the Scout whined that his team sucks). And I start the round by smiling like an idiot.
I'm seriously not THAT good a Medic (not while there are so many better server regular Medics around, even had one in our team), but I'm really happy to hear that at least someone thinks that I don't suck.
Btw, this was after the most risky cap I've ever done, goddamn, I'm hanging around in the tunnel with the one-way door, getting my über up, and the Heavy charges in and immediately out of the doors because the last cap was half-capped, and apparently the defenses were down. I'm THIS close to getting the über, but I decide to follow the Heavy and try to keep him alive, maybe we could cap without the über (besides, points don't cap when you're übered, so while we wait the über to go out, the RED have more time to get on the point and defend). We kill everyone on the point, get on it and cap it. And just as we cap I get the über and naturally I proceed to übering the Heavy for maximum humiliation effect.

I was also practising to stay alive today. There was actually three or four times I stayed alive for three consecutive übers. One of those was an entire Dustbowl round, we defended and won with a shutout (I even joined the game after setup time, so I didn't have the setup charge up when I went to the battle).
But yeah, it seems that three's the magic number, I ALWAYS die after the third über.
And yeah, of course I probably would've gotten six or so übers with all the healing I did in the Gravel Pit match, but I'm not going to waste the charges, that's for sure. And I'm certain that if I use the über to take out an odd Soldier, the REAL attack force comes in right after that and then I don't have the über when we need one. And that's why I also DIE way too often while holding a full charge.

But yeah, I was doing pretty well today, all in all. More of this, and more of melée only Well matches.

I can't stop blogging!

Okay, so I'm apparently going to blog like a nutcase about the upcoming update, but fucking hell I can't help it! News, pictures, videos! In a steady stream! And I'm getting more and more excited with each new thing that I stumble upon!
I think I'm in trouble if Valve Time comes into play and the update won't see daylight in Sunday...

My new favourite thing is this video. (Embeddan gaems! Let's see how this goes...)



First of all, Critskrieg in action! I'm quite disturbed by the un-shinyness of the actual charge. No one's even going to notice there's a critzkrieging going on until they start seeing some Soldier critting nonstop. And that's gonna be horrible with Heavies and Pyros when you can't actually see the crits. All you're going to see is your teammates mowed down. That's going to be nasty.
But yeah, that seemed pretty devastating. Even with the Soldier backing away and reloading at some point, they still killed pretty much everyone there.
(...I'm changing my mind about the Critskrieg again, I might wanna get it after all. If I only could.)

And second of all, and the real reason I can't stop watching the video: Goldrush. I can't WAIT to actually get to play it. That really narrow tunnel after the first checkpoint? Going to be hell. Imagine some critzkrieged Pyro charging the entire escorting BLU team there... and oh man, that map's going to be a real challenge for BLU Engineers. I figure teleporters can make a world of difference after the first checkpoint is cleared. And you'd have to move them up all the time. I wonder how much chaos can one well-placed offensive sentry cause... if an Engie can slip past the defenses... I really wanna see what offensive Engineers can cook up on that map.

Anyway, I just know I'll love Goldrush.

Seriously, people. Christmas.

And Meet the Scout in nine hours on Gametrailers, apparently. I'm actually thinking of staying up to watch it when it comes out. Or then I'll go to bed, have the alarm go off when the video comes out, watch it, and go back to sleep.

Yes, I am that much of a geek.

Also there was an article (which I've seem to lost... no, wait, here it is), where they mentioned that Engineer would be getting some updates too, apparently additional levels to teleporters (shorter recharge time) and dispenser (faster healing).

And uh, I'm going to break my own rules again, but once Goldrush comes out, I'm going to play it first as Soldier. Sorry, me! Because Soldier's safe class, and it's easier for me to get to know the map when I can go where I want to and explore places (I'm a tunnel-vision Medic, I just follow people. I'll never get to know the map that way). Scout would be perfect, but I don't do Scout. I could go Pyro, though, but Soldier's still more reliable for me.

Breaking scores!

I have no idea if I'm any good as Soldier or am I just ridiculously lucky.
I don't spam anymore, and I've noticed how I'm starting to calculate the opponents' possible movements and firing rockets accordingly. So at least I'm getting better, that's for sure.

But take today, for instance: first few maps I absolutely suck. I can't hit anything, I get killed by Pyros (yes, Pyros are still my archnemesis. If you really want to kill me when I'm Soldier, go Pyro and run straight at me. Then laugh at how I succumb to your flames like a Spy), I get killed by anything that's shot at my general direction. And the enemy team wasn't even too overpowered: we were doing quite well.
I suck and I refuse to change classes, because I'M SERIOUSLY NOT THIS HORRIBLE AT THIS, LEMME TRY THAT AGAIN.
Then again, maybe I was just having a bad day. Spies were completely raping me whenever I went Engie (they were good Spies, I admit, because bad ones don't cause me much grief) and this one Scout brat (seriously, the player was a kid, he used a mic. And to me all children are annoying and obnoxious, so excuse me. How do I mute?) kept owning me. Goddamn there's nothing as annoying as someone probably almost fifteen years my junior playing the one class that Engineers usually dominate easily, just effortlessly owning my ass whenever he stumbles by.
He was really good, I give him that.
And there is magic again in Granary, because for some reason I was on top of the scoreboard there. As Soldier. And our team didn't suck, it was actually a pretty damn good team (we didn't win, but it's because the enemy team was even better, duh). But for some reason Granary is my Soldier playground, I always do well there. Strangely enough.
Wasn't a completely rotten Medic when I went one, but oh well. Even racked up some kills in Gravel Pit. Two kills within few seconds: ASSAULT MEDIC. I absolutely hate all them badass Medics, because it's always kinda embarrassing to get killed by syringes. It's completely awesome when I do it, naturally.
And before you ask, for me ze healing comes before ze hurting: I rarely attack as a Medic. Only when I'm cornered or alone (because seriously I ALWAYS have better things to do than kill someone: except when there is no one else around and that goddamn Pyro is heading for our intel), when I KNOW I can get the kill, or when it's a Spy.
But yeah, I've clocked about 33 hours as a Medic, and my kill count is maybe a hundred, so I really don't do much killing when I'm Medic.

But then. Suddenly, I am a kickass Soldier.
It all began when I once again managed to jump on top of cap B in Gravel Pit just as some übered enemy ensemble was rushing the point, so I finally got to cause suffering by firing rockets from the windows at the adorably unaware enemies standing on the point. Aww three defenses. I ran out of ammo pretty fast since I didn't have a dispenser handy, but at least I managed to thwart one of their capture attempts.

Then. Dustbowl. RED. Stage Two. I managed to stay alive from the capping of the first point to the end of the round. Which ended in our victory. I didn't even think about it, but I kept running all around the place, had one Medic healing my ass whenever I was in need (he didn't stick to me, which I think was a good thing, because when I have a Medic I have this tendency to be a bit braver, which usually ends in a gruesome death. YEAH STICKIES ON THE FLOOR WHO CARES 8D and then "boom!"), and if he was not close by, I returned to the nearest dispenser for health and ammo. We kept the enemies pretty far from the point, they didn't really get through the tunnels.
The result?
20 points in one life. 20 fucking points in one life. That's like... I almost spewed my tea all over the monitor when the next round started and "You had more kills as Soldier that round than your previous best - 16" announcement popped up. I hadn't even thought about it! Came as a complete surprise! I kinda realised I stayed alive for a very long time (like I've told you, I die a lot, and I die fast), but I had no idea the whole round was THAT successful! I thought I had maybe gotten eight or so kills.
So, 16 kills, 2 dominations, I'm not quite sure were the rest two points destructions or assists, but who cares. Also damage dealt record and longest life.

Now my Soldier stats don't look so pathetic anymore! My best score before was 9 (which is kinda really pathetic since I've played so much as Soldier. 30 hours, eh. But look at the bright side! At least the thirty hours have taught me something!).
And yeah, it's my best overall score, Medic and Engineer come next with 16 points. Go check my Steam ID if you wanna see more of my stats, no use talking about them when you can just see them for yourself.

Yes, I am aware that the scores don't really matter, but we've gone over this a few times already, so let's just skip it this time.

Also I had no idea how much I would actually end up enjoying playing as Soldier.

And I don't even remember when's the last time I was so embarrassed by something: I was playing in Dustbowl, I was in RED, and we were getting our asses properly kicked by BLU. People were whining how the team sucks and we WERE pretty bad, I admit.
Then Steam kicked me, for some reason or another, and I had to reconnect to the server. So I'm in the team selection screen, the teams have an even number of players and I'm thinking that I'm still gonna go RED because I would have to try to make a difference and come on, it would be simply HORRIBLE to go BLU since they've been owning us.
And then I ACCIDENTALLY CLICK THE BLU DOOR. D: I got in, so I chose a class and quickly returned to the team selection screen because I AM NOT GOING TO DO THIS OH MY GOD, and I see as someone else enters RED and I can't change teams anymore.
I was so embarrassed. I was hoping RED would be able to defend (this was Stage Three) and we would lose because oh my god. Every time someone killed me I kept thinking what they must think of me, how I'm a sore loser and oh god, I totally deserved that crit 'nade or whatever.
We didn't get the last point, so at least justice was served. To me, anyhow.
(It also wasn't a surprise why BLU was so superior: they communicated really well.)
What makes it even more embarrassing, is because I always get really angry when autobalance hits, some poor sod is tranferred to the losing team, and they immediately disconnect and try to get back into their old team. I think it's probably the lamest thing ever. Way to take the game a bit too seriously, dipshit!
And yeah, I hate it too when autobalance hits, but I would NEVER disconnect and try to join my old team. Take the epic Dustbowl match a few days back, when I got switched to RED. I was annoyed, but I just sucked it up and started killing my old team mates. And I ended up having so much fun and actually winning, so.

I also have my own headset now, but I still chicken out of actually using it.
And "comfortable to wear over long periods" my ass, I wore it for five hours and now my ears hurt like sons of bitches. It's also not very practical with glasses, stupid neckband. But! It's got good-enough sound and the mic works, so I'm not going to whine. A lot.
Now if I could just get over the fact that I sound like an idiot, and actually use the thing. I speak very good English, damn it, but when I get nervous I start stuttering and my otherwise so normal (albeit probably strange to native speakers) accent turns into this stiff Finnish accent and I pronounce words all wrong and ouch.