For those of you not in the know, TF2 recently had another double class update to both the Demoman and the Soldier: the War Update. Most of this update was cause for great joy: it introduced several great new maps, it introduced a crafting system, and it gave the two classes a bunch of fun, useful, and balanced weapons... with one exception.
That exception is the Direct Hit, the Soldier's alternate rocket launcher. This launcher shoots rockets at a faster rate than the normal one, deals more damage than the normal one, and deals automatic mini-crits to any enemy in the air. The only downside to the user is that it has a reduced blast radius.
And it pisses me the hell off.
Why do I dislike the Direct Hit? I think it does far too much damage currently. The Direct Hit can one-shot a Scout, even without hitting the Scout in midair... and ironically, most of the time it will be hitting the Scout in the air, since Scouts love to hop about like a madman when trying to dodge explosives. When you add into the equation the fact that Scouts have to get up close and personal to do the majority of their damage, the reduced blast radius doesn't mean diddly.
Scouts aren't the only ones suffering though: the Direct Hit can also kill Heavies VERY quickly. Scouts at least have the speed to make them decently hard to hit: but Heavies are fat, blundering targets. Their high hitpoint totals are inconsequential: from what I've seen, in the face of any Soldier worth his salt and the Direct Hit in hand, the Heavy is going to lose unless he's already spun up his gun, the Soldier is wounded, or he's being healed (and even then, it's a toss up as to who the winner will be.)
Heavies used to be something to fear.
People have attempted to argue that this damage increase is a-ok thanks to the blast radius being reduced (aka the weapon requires more skill to use), but this is counteracted by the speed of the rockets. Soldiers using the old launcher had to predict where the enemies were going to dodge in order to hit them with the slow-moving missiles, but the DH's rockets are fast enough that the Soldier no longer needs to worry about such things. It's actually EASIER to use in a way, once you get used to the rocket speed. And even if it weren't easy to use, there's so many people playing Soldier right now with the DH equipped that if a moderately skilled player isn't around to kill you, the spam from 6 man DH Soldier teams will.
Perhaps the hatred I feel towards the Direct Hit will go down a bit post-Christmas, when the Soldier spamming has been reduced, but for some reason I doubt it. Unless the weapon is nerfed or changed in some way, I feel that it's rough times ahead for anyone who isn't a Demoman armed with the Chargin' Targe.
So how do the TF2 players out there feel about the Direct Hit? Do you think that it's just a problem of there being too many Soldiers right now, or is the weapon imbalanced? Or do you not see much of a problem at all?
That exception is the Direct Hit, the Soldier's alternate rocket launcher. This launcher shoots rockets at a faster rate than the normal one, deals more damage than the normal one, and deals automatic mini-crits to any enemy in the air. The only downside to the user is that it has a reduced blast radius.
And it pisses me the hell off.
Why do I dislike the Direct Hit? I think it does far too much damage currently. The Direct Hit can one-shot a Scout, even without hitting the Scout in midair... and ironically, most of the time it will be hitting the Scout in the air, since Scouts love to hop about like a madman when trying to dodge explosives. When you add into the equation the fact that Scouts have to get up close and personal to do the majority of their damage, the reduced blast radius doesn't mean diddly.
Scouts aren't the only ones suffering though: the Direct Hit can also kill Heavies VERY quickly. Scouts at least have the speed to make them decently hard to hit: but Heavies are fat, blundering targets. Their high hitpoint totals are inconsequential: from what I've seen, in the face of any Soldier worth his salt and the Direct Hit in hand, the Heavy is going to lose unless he's already spun up his gun, the Soldier is wounded, or he's being healed (and even then, it's a toss up as to who the winner will be.)
Heavies used to be something to fear.
People have attempted to argue that this damage increase is a-ok thanks to the blast radius being reduced (aka the weapon requires more skill to use), but this is counteracted by the speed of the rockets. Soldiers using the old launcher had to predict where the enemies were going to dodge in order to hit them with the slow-moving missiles, but the DH's rockets are fast enough that the Soldier no longer needs to worry about such things. It's actually EASIER to use in a way, once you get used to the rocket speed. And even if it weren't easy to use, there's so many people playing Soldier right now with the DH equipped that if a moderately skilled player isn't around to kill you, the spam from 6 man DH Soldier teams will.
Perhaps the hatred I feel towards the Direct Hit will go down a bit post-Christmas, when the Soldier spamming has been reduced, but for some reason I doubt it. Unless the weapon is nerfed or changed in some way, I feel that it's rough times ahead for anyone who isn't a Demoman armed with the Chargin' Targe.
So how do the TF2 players out there feel about the Direct Hit? Do you think that it's just a problem of there being too many Soldiers right now, or is the weapon imbalanced? Or do you not see much of a problem at all?
