Team Fortress 2 Strategy

Finally, FINALLY giving me something to write about (other than the sub-prime crisis), Sir Walker has once more updated the Official TF2 Blog. Unfortunately, word is that the next class pack is coming along “a little slower than we’d like”, but given Valve’s proportional relationship between delay and quality, I guess it’s something of a two-edged retractable entrenchment tool.

Walker’s post follows (distantly) in the footsteps of the exposé of the rampy nature of the Medic’s healing beam, which was welcome clarification for an important, rather black-boxish mechanic, one thought. Today’s post instead focuses on those bloody respawn times and Y THYE TAEK SO LONGGG ARRRRRG!!!!1. As it happens:

Respawn waves occur on regular intervals, based on the map settings. Most of our maps use a 10 second respawn wave time. That 10 seconds is then modified by the map state, generally reduced for the team that controls the most capture points. [...] When you die, you are assigned to the respawn wave after the next one. So if the respawn wave time is currently 10 seconds for your team, you’ll respawn somewhere between 10 and 20 seconds from your death. Your individual performance doesn’t affect your respawn time in any way.

This is all accompanied by some design philosophy backing the respawn timers up, so head over and take a gander. Oh, and Erik Wolpaw was mentioned, hence completing the awful double entendre up there. HA HA! Body in a woodchipper.