4v4 – Fun but not serious, sadly

Week 8 of the UGC 4v4 season has come to a close, and we all breathe a sigh of relief as we thank some Deity that we don’t need to play against platinum and gold players any more. It was a lot of fun. Team SPUF (Special Party of Underrated Failures) finished the season 3-4, winning 3 rounds by forfeit and getting kinda rolled in the 4 matches we lost. And by kinda, I mean completely. But I can’t blame us for losing. We had to play against genuinely hard teams. Every single team we actually played against was UGC… [Continue Reading]

Read more

Medic does Competitive… or not…

At the start of UGC season 5 of 4v4 and season 18 of 6v6, I had a plan. The plan was to document my time playing through two seasons. It’d be full of ups and downs, interesting things and stuff I learned. The story of a Medic going from pub server nobody to competitive game nobody. And a bit of fun. As you can plainly see, that hasn’t happened. Originally, the reason I stopped writing was because I didn’t really want to write about our awful 6v6 losses. 6v6 was supposed to be the main focus of the series of… [Continue Reading]

Read more

Medic does Competitive – 6v6 and 4v4 week 4

It gets better and better! Actually that’s a lie, but compared to last week, at least for 6v6, it was a huge improvement. 4v4… Not so much, but I guess at least we actually got to play. Week 4 for 6v6 was alright. We had a team trying to get into Platinum (because UGC doesn’t have enough divisions for anyone but North America and just throws everyone else into a stupid pile, and because the season is only 8 weeks, there’s not enough time for proper matchmaking to happen) playing against a team getting their feet wet in a new… [Continue Reading]

Read more

Medic Does Competitive – 6v6 and 4v4 Week 3

Well, it’s going from bad to worse around here, as this week left me not really wanting to play TF2 any more. It’s all too much for me, I’m far too inexperienced and rusty and I suck at 5cp. Really, it’s all my fault. With Confusion missing in action still, I had to organize everything again. But this week I have been caught up by real life too. I didn’t manage to organize a scrim or anything at all, so this week’s maps, cp_Sunshine and koth_badlands were both untouched. The biggest problem was trying to find a time for people… [Continue Reading]

Read more

Medic Does Competitive – Week 2 6v6 and 4v4

Ah, matchmaking. A process in which you’re matched up with enemies of a somewhat similar skill level, in the hopes that you’ll have a nice, happy, balanced but challenging match. Except maybe not. This week’s competitive events were not exactly fun for everyone involved. So, the 4v4 team known as SCUD is no more. We formed a new team called SPUF EU, consisting of myself, Confusion, Sham and Davjo, with Keith and Jensen as subs and newcomer w0lk joining the ranks. Last season, we finished off in 9th place in Euro Steel, with a somewhat okay score of 6-3. This… [Continue Reading]

Read more

Medic’s Sixth and Seventh Ever Competitive Matches – I don’t know any more!

As the season is now over and there’s no more matches, I’ve decided to combine these two articles, as a quick overview of both week 8 and week 9. Both somewhat interesting, both pitting teams of hugely varied experience against one another. Week 8 was the last official match week, and week 9 was the start of the playoffs. The skill levels are all over the place, man! All over the place! And so is the ping. Also included is week 7, which was stupid. Week 7 was a blow out, the other team forfeited. They messed us around, unable… [Continue Reading]

Read more

Confusion’s 4vs4 reflection

I have quite enjoyed reading Medic’s detailed reports about our team’s exploits on the new frontier known as 4vs4, and now the season has conceded for us, I believe now would be an excellent time to write a post about some of it. What have we learned? Silliness is a valid tactic Act bold and audacious, but don’t depend completely on luck. We saw a lot of different weapons and tactics being used; Engies, Phlogs, Demoknights, simultaneous Sniper and Spies… Situational tactics are very useful… in the right hands. A lot of the better teams (on steel at least) have a… [Continue Reading]

Read more

Thoughts on my first season of competitive TF2

Season 4 of 4v4 was my first ever step into competitive TF2, after months of people telling me I’d do really well, that I’d be perfectly alright, that I was plenty good enough, even though I can only play Medic. They may have been right, but I’m still not sure and I’m not sure whether I want to continue or not. At least in 4v4. The first thing I noticed is organization. For 4v4, matches are on Friday, to be completed and scores updated by Monday. But it’s really hard just trying to get a date from the other team.… [Continue Reading]

Read more

Medic’s Fifth Ever Competitive Match – 404 Medic not Found

No, seriously. What just happened? I have no idea. Week 6’s match was absolutely all over the place. I’ve decided, I’m not actually going to attempt to describe it. I don’t think I can. It was mental. Insane. Crazy. I don’t know any more! So instead of trying to make something coherent from that match, I’m just going to go over all the good bits. But first off, self-loathing! Turns out, I suck at every class but Medic, and I really need to play more Demoman, because sticky bombs and the Pain Train are the best weapons ever. Maybe try… [Continue Reading]

Read more

Less and Less Sure about 4v4

So, the more I play 4v4, the less and less sure I feel about it. This isn’t because of my two recent losses, no. I played a random 4v4 lobby and did really well. It’s the game mode. It really is. There is something off about 4v4 that 6v6 and Highlander both seem to have. And the pressure… The pressure… 4v4 has always been a much more deathmatch-centric game mode. It’s all about keeping yourself alive and the enemy dead for as long as possible. But you have to keep everyone alive. Losing one person, even just a Scout, is… [Continue Reading]

Read more