Pyro has been reduced to a W+M1 machine

When news of Tough Break broke (mind the pun) I expressed how excited I was. That was mostly due to the plethora of balance changes, some of which many of us have been whining about for years and years (Half-Zatoichi crits, for one.) On first glance it really did seem like a nearly perfect update. In practice, though, you’ll find pubs flooded with Phlog Pyros. That’s because this update destroyed Pyro as we know it.

All-Class
– Base weapon switch speed changed from 0.67 seconds to 0.5 seconds
…
Pyro
– Pyros like to collect rainbows! Extinguishing a teammate will now return 20 health to the Pyro.
– Consecutive Airblasts will no longer prevent enemies from air-strafing until they touch the ground
– The base Flamethrower’s damage fall off over distance has been decreased, resulting in higher damage output at range
Degreaser
– No longer boosts all-around switch speed. Instead, boosts switch-to speed by 60% and switch-from speed by 30%.
– Removed damage penalty
– Increased Airblast cost by 25%
– Increased afterburn penalty to from 25% to 66%
Phlogistinator
– Removed 10% damage penalty.
– When activating ‘MMMPH’, the taunting Pyro gains temporary invulnerability and immunity to knockback effects
Axtinguisher
– Properties changed
– 100% Chance to crit against burning targets
– 33% Damage penalty
– 20% Slower attack speed
– 75% Slower switch-to speed

Anyone familiar with Pyro will freak right out upon reading this. It seems like a violent Pyro hater’s dream. Let’s examine it more closely.

– Base weapon switch speed changed from 0.67 seconds to 0.5 seconds
– Consecutive Airblasts will no longer prevent enemies from air-strafing until they touch the ground
Degreaser
– No longer boosts all-around switch speed. Instead, boosts switch-to speed by 60% and switch-from speed by 30%.
– Removed damage penalty
– Increased Airblast cost by 25%
– Increased afterburn penalty to from 25% to 66%

It seems like these changes are conspiring together to destroy the Degreaser. First of all, a global decrease in the duration of weapon switch speed immediately makes the Degreaser less useful – after all, its entire appeal is being able to switch rapidly between primary/secondary/melee to get flareshots, and previously, Axt kills. Being able to airblast people into the air/corners/etc combined with the rapid switch speed meant that a good Pyro could juggle anyone and kill them with ease. And now you can strafe away from airblasts, which is a pretty fair thing in itself, but combined with the other changes, it’s kind of a disaster for Pyro.

The Degreaser changes make it a lot less useful than previously, but not beyond the point of no return. The switch speed is a big hit. While switching to it is, on paper, even faster than the overall switch speed it had before the nerf, switching away is slower. This could easily mean the difference between being being too slow to get to your flare or melee or getting the kill in a fast-paced situation. Still, the biggest hit it took is the airblast cost increase from 20 to 25, meaning you can only airblast 8 times from full ammo instead of 10. This isn’t too bad, chances are you’re not going to need to airblast 9 or 10 times before collecting any ammo, but it can make a difference. The afterburn penalty is still meaningless, the Degreaser was never used for burning people.

So on their own these changes aren’t putting the Degreaser in the ground, they’ve just started digging the grave. Here comes the real kicker, and where the title of this article really comes in.

Phlogistinator
– Removed 10% damage penalty.
– When activating ‘MMMPH’, the taunting Pyro gains temporary invulnerability and immunity to knockback effects

Just a couple of little changes for this one. No more damage penalty, which wasn’t a massive factor anyway. However now Pyro is literally a statue when he’s activating MMMPH. Knockback immunity during taunt is a mixed nerf/buff, but in most situation, it’s a buff. Being airblasted during taunt previously cancelled it and meant you got your crits straight away, but it also meant you could be airblasted backward a couple times and thus a few crucial seconds could be cut off of your imminent rampage, giving the other team time to gain distance before you charge at them. It made taunting in the open pretty much impractical. Also being vulnerable to damage, albeit with high damage resistance, was a deterrent, and now that’s gone. Pyro gets momentary Uber during taunt.

This means you can just run onto the other team’s point with full MMMPH, activate it, and they’re forced to choose between staying to prevent your cap, or running to avoid dying. 99% of the time you’re going to open up a giant hole in their front line. And why? Because you dealt 500 damage and then taunted, that’s why. Then you can charge them as they retreat and probably got a good few kills and set a lot of people on fire.

Oh, I threw in the Axt changes up there, didn’t I? Yeah, the poor Axtinguisher. He’s been nerfed well and truly into uselessness now. I’m fairly sure it takes about a full second after switching to actually be able to hit anyone with this thing. And it will deal something in the range of 140 damage, not even enough to oneshot a Medic. You’re really better off spamming flames in their face rather than wasting your time trying to switch to the Axt and probably getting shot the whole time. Powerjack is my go-to melee now, it’s good for chasing people down after using MMMPH as well as more traditional uses. Synergy.

So if Valve was aiming for taking Pyro back to his much more simple and terrible vanilla roots, this is how you do it. Anyone trying to play Pyro with any degree of skill will find themselves sorely lacking compared to their WM1 counterparts. I tried using Degreaser/flare/axt earlier and got demolished. Meanwhile Phlog/flare/powerjack got me results like these:

I wasn’t even being subtle about this, for the record. I would usually taunt in the middle of a group of enemies, easily kill the ones dumb enough to stick around, and chase them down if they ran away, assisted by the Powerjack.

If you’re looking for actual content with insight, here’s a Reddit thread from a guy who knows what he’s talking about.

And if you’re looking for typical Reddit shitposting, here’s another thread.