jump_detr_v1f

Jumpmaps have long provided a place for enthusiasts of advanced mobility to practice their skills.  Soaring gracefully on the blast of a rocket, being propelled upwards by stickybomb explosions – and, more recently, hopping about with the distinctive firework sound of the Detonator! That’s right, Pyro mobility enthusiasts!  You can rejoice, because jump_detr_v1f is here for your Detonating needs!   Because of its relatively minuscule jumps and less widespread use, even many experienced players have minimal practice with the Detonator and are not able to take full advantage of the possibilities it offers.  I can truthfully state from my own experiences… [Continue Reading]

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“Mirrored Maps” event results!

That event was, in my personal opinion, one of our best yet! Ultimately Team 1 swept in a 3-1 victory, losing only Lwobtsud to a ninja backcap by team 2 spy John Caveson. But the real point was to try some mind-bending maps that challenged the hundreds of hours we collectively have on the classics, and I saw more than one person bump into a wall during the event. Kip‘s streams of the event are posted on Youtube for those who’d like to rewatch the event. Thanks Kip and KobeKun for casting the event! And if you missed it, don’t… [Continue Reading]

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In Defense of Nucleus

I frequently play on KotH servers that rotate the stock maps, and I have found that the least popular KotH map that comes up is Nucleus. It seems everyone loves Harvest and Lakeside, find Sawmill and Viaduct tolerable, but they seem to hate Nucleus. I personally cannot figure out why! So why is Nucleus a good map? Lack of Spammability on the Central Point One thing that Viaduct and Sawmill, and to a lesser extent, Harvest, suffer from is the ever-present spam around the final point. Soldiers and Demomen lob rockets, grenades, and stickies onto the point as if they… [Continue Reading]

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The Best Bad Maps

Now, if you have seen me talk about maps at all on the forums, you may notice that I really don’t pay attention to anything but the looks. TF2’s artstyle inspires sceneryboners for me on a daily basis, so much so that years ago I tried twice hold a poll on which skybox was the best. I mean, look at this concept for the Alpine skybox and map design. But really, we all know that Tf2’s artstyle is down the drain, right? Or at least that’s the gist I get from a lot of people complaining about it. In any… [Continue Reading]

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Fixing A Hole

It’s no secret that some of the senior staff here at SPUF really like Special Delivery and the only map that supports it, Doomsday. However, one common thing that many people I talk to about Doomsday tell me is that the entire map is a horrendously mapped, broken pile of garbage. And they’re absolutely right. As aabicus put it when I spoke with him several nights ago, “It’s like Valve forgets about the Sticky Jumper when they make maps.” The opposite seems to be true as well, in that the folks at Valve forget about maps when they made the Sticky Jumper. Doomsday… [Continue Reading]

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January 23rd – January 30th

A fairly exciting week, this week, on 25th January, saw the addition of everyone’s completely forgotten favourite CTF map, CTF_Well, as well as some particle optimizations and a few bug fixes, particularly on Gravelpit. It took a very long time though for some very simple things, such as Medics getting a percentage on their Ubercharge meters. This wasn’t added until January 28th in 2009! Also added were the update progress and the level of an Engineer’s buildings in their HUD.

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Trade Maps

Trading servers are a dime a dozen. They’re dime-a-dozen back-stabbing scumbags… No, wait, sorry, I was thinking of Spies. But there are lots of trade servers, from trade_plaza to trade_minecraft to trade_rawr to trade_achievement_idle_noglass, and so on and so forth. While some of these maps, like trade_minecraft_realms, are wonderfully made, with all sorts of pretty things, randomized spawns, health kits in convenient places  and stuff, most trade servers are incredibly simple. Two spawn rooms and a room in the middle connecting them. Boring, eh? Well, let’s go deeper…

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Advanced Doomsday Strats (and some glitches)

Since my last article on sd_doomsday, I’ve played the map a lot more, and learned a lot more about how to maximize your presence and worth on the battlefield. I’ve also learned a couple of glitches with the map, and since I don’t have enough of either to justify its own article, today we’re killing two monkeys with one stone. Strat 1- Best rollout: This is, in my opinion, the most optimal way a single player can spend the opening minute of the round to help his team: sticky-jumping over to the enemy intel door and controlling it before they… [Continue Reading]

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