Vitals
Health: 150
Speed: 107%
Type: Support
Weapons: Syringe Gun, Medigun, Bonesaw
Unlockables: Blutsauger, Kritzkrieg, Ubersaw
Ability: Regenerates health (up to 100%) over time. For every 5 seconds you’re not damaged, the rate of healing will increase by 1, from the starting rate of 1 HP per second up to 3 HP/s.
Weapons:
Ammo: 40/150
Damage: 8-14 (30), about 80-140 per second (300/sec)
Best range: Short to medium
Information:
The medic’s syringe gun is a custom-built flechette launcher that rapid fires up to 40 syringes from a rotating clip on top of the gun. Each syringe is quite weak, but used expertly the syringe gun can at least put up a fight that demands respect. The syringes it fires are heavily affected by gravity, travelling in quite a steep arc, so practice is necessary to quickly determine how high to aim to hit a target at various distances. Also, like the grenade and rocket launchers, you should try and predict where the target will be in about half a second and aim there, since the projectiles are quite slow.
The syringe gun is best used in as narrow a path as possible, since the syringes flying towards the target form a kind of wall that they can’t avoid being hit by. For example backpedalling in the narrow corridors in 2Fort while firing at a pursuing enemy means they can’t go forward without being needled. If every syringe hits it’s about 400 damage, so it can also be effective if you can sneak up behind a stationary enemy (heavy, sniper or similar). However in this instance you may just opt for the bone saw.
Advantages: Rapid fire, quick reload, projectiles travelling through the air create a kind of wall, potentially long range, quite effective against stationary targets, decent amount of reserve ammo.
Disadvantages: Relatively weak, syringes heavily affected by gravity, difficult to effectively damage moving targets.
Ammo: N/A
Healing: ?/sec (? - it does seem to crit heal sometimes, but I have no proof or numbers)
Best range: Short to medium
Information:
The medigun is really the medic’s primary weapon, and it’s the only gun in the game that can heal. To heal a teammate, put your crosshair on them and hold down primary fire. So long as they don’t get too far away and you can maintain line of sight, your healing beam should heal them constantly. Also worth noting is that healing a teammate with full health causes their health to increase up to 150% where it stays so long as you keep healing. If you stop, it will slowly fall back to 100%. Finally, you receive 1 point for every 600 health you heal, which I believe is up to 150%.
Regarding the somewhat liquid nature of the healing beam, you don’t actually have to be looking at your target. Therefore a good tactic is to look behind you often to watch out for spies, especially when your buddy is tied up in combat. If you see one, bust out your bone saw and chop him down. Also although the beam can kind of bend around corners, it can only do so for a second or two before getting cut off, so either get behind your buddy and use him as a shield, or sit against the wall as he goes around the corner.
And the awesomest aspect of the medigun is of course the übercharge. When you heal teammates, your übercharge meter fills up (the rate depends on how much health the target currently has, it charges faster when you heal more injured players), and when that meter hits 100%, the medic can activate the übercharge by hitting secondary fire. The medic will become invulnerable for 10 seconds so long as the medigun remains equipped, and any target of the medigun’s beam during that time receives the same benefits as long as they remain the target.
Advantages: Heals teammates, can buff teammates to 150% health, ability to übercharge teammates, no ammo to worry about, flexible healing beam, decent range, keeping teammates alive gives the medic a higher chance of survival.
Disadvantages: Utterly ineffective against enemies.
Ammo: N/A
Damage: 43-87 (195)
Information:
The bone saw is a weapon to be feared, despite the supporting role of the medic. Taking advantage of his speed, the medic can keep pace with any class except the scout, so it is much easier to land consecutive blows. It’s about as strong as every other melee weapon, and is 1st for most frequent critical hits (according to Valve’s TF2 Stats).
Ammo: 40/150
Damage: 8-14 (no crits), ~80-140 per second
Healing: 3
Best range: Short to medium
Requires: 1/3 of the new Medic Achievements
Information:
German for ‘bloodsucker’, the blutsauger is a handy replacement for the medigun. By itself, the medigun was different from most other weapons in the game, and the blutsauer makes 2 significant changes to it. First of all, the blutsauer cannot get critical hits, and since crits were one of the only things that made the syringe gun a viable weapon, this greatly affects the blutsauer’s offensive capability. However the good news is that every hit you land with the blutsauer grants you an immediate 3 health. With a clip of 40 needles, there’s potential for significant healing, and this makes it ideal for retreating from an enemy while leeching health.
Advantages: Rapid fire, quick reload, leeches health from target every hit, projectiles travelling through the air create a kind of wall, able to hit distant stationary targets, decent amount of reserve ammo.
Disadvantages: Relatively weak, never scores critical hits, syringes heavily affected by gravity, difficult to effectively damage moving targets.
Ammo: N/A
Healing: ?/sec (? - see Medigun)
Best range: Short to medium
Requires: 2/3 of the new Medic Achievements
Information:
The effects of the medic’s alternate medigun were the subject of much discussion leading up to the update, and with good reason. The use of the medic’s ’secondary’ weapon is what changes games, and not having a balanced weapon would negatively affect everyone. The original concept of the Overhealer, which lost the ability to übercharge in exchange for permanent 100% buffing would most likely not have worked in the context of the game, and the end result of Valve’s headscratching was the Kritzkrieg.
The kritkrieg functions almost identically to the medigun. It heals the same, and also buffs up to 50% of the target’s health - the only difference (apart from appearance which isn’t all that different either) lies in the effect of deploying the übercharge when the meter hits 100%. While the medigun grants 10 seconds of invulnerability to the medic and his target, the kritzkrieg grants the target 10 seconds of 100% chance to fire critical oridnance. I haven’t yet looked into whether the medic receives critical healing for this period, but I’m thinking that would be a bit overpowered, since constant critical healing is almost as good as invulnerability.
Advantages: Heals teammates, can buff teammates to 150% health, übercrit ability gives target 100% crit chance for 10 seconds, no ammo to worry about, flexible healing beam, decent range, keeping teammates alive gives the medic a higher chance of survival.
Disadvantages: Utterly ineffective against enemies, no übercharge ability.
Ammo: N/A
Damage: 43-87 (195)
Requires: All 36 of the new Medic Achievements
Information:
The ubersaw is virtually a beefed up bonesaw. Aside from the awesomely gruesome look of the thing, it has the bonus of adding 25% to your übercharge meter with every hit. The drawback is that it has a 20% slower attack speed than the bonesaw, but I don’t see anyone finding this reason enough to not take it up. Did I mention it looks awesome?
posted on March 28th, 2008 at 1:04 pm