aabicus – Page 52 – The Daily SPUF

Spicing Up Medieval Mode

December 26, 2014 aabicus 0 Comments game mode, maps, medieval

Who remembers Medieval Mode? It’s hard to forget it, what with its unique premise, acceptable breaks from its own premise and a game balance that I don’t think anyone truly understands. But I’ve been having trouble finding populated Medieval servers, and this saddens me because for what its got, I enjoy the balance between the classes. But I think there are definitely some things that could improve the game mode. At the core of things, it could really do with some more content. Right now it suffers from a limited version of Territorial Control-syndrome, where the mode concept is fine… [Continue Reading]

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Beginner’s Guide to Loadouts in Left 4 Dead 2

December 20, 2014 aabicus 0 Comments advice, guide, Left 4 Dead 2, loadout, shotgun

It has come to my attention that very few people on TF2 SPUF play Left 4 Dead 2. This is a real shame because the game is very, very fun and in recent months I’ve found it consuming far more of my allotted game time than TF2 does. So I basically thought I’d just write a quick guide detailing two of my favorite loadouts in the hopes that this info might help you if you ever decide to pick the game up. Left 4 Dead 2 has a wonderful array of weaponry, and the best part is that all of it… [Continue Reading]

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Flaring Up

December 14, 2014 aabicus 0 Comments analysis, balance, pyro, request, shotgun

Poor Pyro can’t seem to catch a break. Ever since his Team Fortress Classic days people have derided him as underpowered, unbalanced, gimmicky, over-reliant on newb opponents…the insults are as varied as the tools Valve has bestowed upon the poor unintelligible merc. Plenty of people have written opinions on why Pyro is underpowered (here’s mine) and even more people have written theories on how to fix that problem. Before I go into that, I want to try and sum up some fundamentals that are often brought up. Firstly, Pyro’s short-range emphasis is seen as one of his major problems since… [Continue Reading]

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Dearly Departed SPUFers

December 12, 2014 aabicus 0 Comments history, recap, SPUF

As I’m trapped on a 14-hour bus ride because I missed my 14-hour train ride and now have to grapple with the financial and physical discomfort this situation puts me in, I’ve been in something of a pensive mood. As my entertainment options have dwindled to draining the power on my no-internet laptop or observing the wonderfully repetitive West Virginian nature whizzing past the windshield, I thought I might take this opportunity to talk about some SPUFers who have disappeared as the years roll by. Obviously every forumite must disappear someday, I guess the most one can hope for is that they get to… [Continue Reading]

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A Shotgun Update

December 8, 2014 aabicus 0 Comments balance, economy, heavy, MvM, request, shotgun, update

I adore the Team Fortress 2 shotgun. Sturdy, reliable, and intuitive, it’s the only weapon shared by four different classes and until the BASE Jumper was added, the only weapon to occupy different slots on different classes. I consider the shotgun TF2’s tenth signature weapon due to its ubiquity and recognizability. There is a sort of elegance in the fact that Valve has never added any sort of reskin or retexture for the shotgun. Every player since 2007 who’s wanted to make use of its six-clip buckshot backup has used the same simple gun; no golden, festive or botkiller variants… [Continue Reading]

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Gunslingers vs. Highlanders: an analysis

December 4, 2014 aabicus 0 Comments analysis, demoknight, engineer, event, Highlander, medic, scout, theory

There was recently something of an upset when the Highlander team swept the Gunslingers in the recent tournament, and it rightly seems to have attracted something of an interest in the SPUF community. (I notice there hasn’t been a single thread arguing the Gunslinger is OP since the event…) Since I’ve participated in two of these events, playing Medic for Season 2 (the first time the Gunslingers won) and the most recent Season 5, I’ve got a pretty good perspective from which to analyze the two teams. On a fundamental level, the first major reason that Highlanders performed so much better… [Continue Reading]

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The Spoils of WAR!

December 2, 2014 aabicus 0 Comments comparison, demoman, soldier, weapon

Ever since Demoman lost the WAR! under some pretty spotty rationale regarding a propaganda contest, many people have asked that Valve migrate the Gunboats over to the Demoman, either through a wholesale migration, release of a Demoman-only reskin (the ginboats?) or a reworking of the Wee Booties. Sometimes this wish extends also to the other weapon tailored to explosive-jumping, the Market Gardener. After all, Soldier and Demoman already share the BASE Jumper and orange-painted Jumper weapons, why not go all the way? As a Demoman main, I’d adore them on a basic level. A Dapper Apple found the concept super powerful when… [Continue Reading]

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What if Scout Got a Grenade Launcher?

November 27, 2014 aabicus 0 Comments balance, comparison, demoman, loadout, scout, weapon

Would you be interested in playing the Scout with the Grenade Launcher as your primary? Or perhaps the Loose Cannon for all you Force-a-Nature fans? It might seem a bit different at first, having to rely on explosives instead of hitscan, but I don’t doubt an enterprising player could find a way to make it work. I’ll stop beating around the bush. If you have any interest in playing a scout with a grenade launcher, try the Sticky Jumper. Several users on SPUF have been complaining (again) about the jumpers, claiming that they’re impossible to use efficiently and should be… [Continue Reading]

Community Announcements

Gunslingers vs. Highlanders V results!

November 17, 2014 aabicus 0 Comments announcement, engineer, game mode, Highlander, recap

Season 5 of Gunslinger vs Highlander has come and gone, and once again SPUF’s longest-lasting circuit has surprised everyone with a Highlander sweep. After securing pl_swiftwater by preventing the Gunslingers from capping second and then capping first in fewer seconds, Highlander secured the midpoint and pushed all the way into last, winning 3 times in a row for best 3/5. While this technically ended the event, both teams decided to play koth_ashville anyway, and here’s where the matches really got close. Several could have gone either way, but ultimately Team Highlander won the first three matches, taking king-of-the-hill and becoming… [Continue Reading]

Community Announcements Featured

Gunslinger versus Highlander 5

November 11, 2014 aabicus 1 Comment engineer, event, Highlander, SPUF

It’s been too long since we’ve done a SPUF event, and this one was always popular. The minisentry has also been nerfed since the last time we did these, so I think now is an appropriate time to do this. DATE 2014-11-16 (Sunday) at 1:00 PM EST. SERVER The server will be located in the central US. I will provide an IP a few hours before the match. RULES+ That’s right! Unlike previous seasons, we actually have rules! Organization! Can you believe it? • Stay positive and have fun. Don’t be that guy screaming over the mic because your team lost mid… [Continue Reading]