Shacknews is reporting that the new unlockable Medic gear has been detailed by Valve. At a party. That I wasn’t invited to.
It includes the following:
The Blutsaugher: A syringe gun that draws health from enemies at the expense of critical hits. Unlocked after a third of the achievements have been completed.
The Critzcrieg: The ubercrit healer we heard about a few weeks ago, that gives 10 seconds of critical hits to the medic’s uberbuddy at the expense of invulnerability. Unlocked after two-thirds of the achievements have been completed.
The Ubersaw: Once a medic has all the achievements, he’ll get a new bonesaw, which, when doing damage against enemies, will feed his ubercharge.
It all sounds pretty good to me, actually. The new needlegun and ubersaw give the medic some real offensive oomph, which I think he needs, and the Critzcrieg will be an interesting alternative to the invulnerability. I’m looking forward to it.
The downside? Get ready to see servers with a LOT of medics running around like crazy looking to get all their achievements. Boy howdy. It’s gonna be a major clusterfuck of medics for a loooooong while.
EDIT: More info (including some about Goldrush) in this article here. The ubersaw adds 25% to your uber in a single hit! Cripes! However, it’s slower to attack with.
27 responses so far ↓
1 Pentadact // Apr 16, 2008 at 8:02 am
AWESOME. I’m off work this week, so this is the first I’m hearing of it. Critzcrieg is an awesome name for that thing - I was thinking of Ubercritter. Surely “Critzkrieg”, though?
I’m glad one of the weapons gives the physician a new way to heal thyself. I was rootin’ for that to be the bonesaw, but an Uber-feeding one is fine.
Can’t have too many medics on a team. Says a Spy.
2 Joniko // Apr 16, 2008 at 8:33 am
Sounds great, but again no release date…
Everybody is talking about the week of the 20th, but I somehow don’t really believe it.
I hope they add some new responses as well, the doctor’s “Octoberfäst” is cool, but “Sauerkraut” or some Goethe-quotes would be cool as well.
3 Ev // Apr 16, 2008 at 9:10 am
Pentadact, don’t forget about your Ubercharge meter. Says a Contra-Spy.
4 Pentadact // Apr 16, 2008 at 9:33 am
Holy shit, it only takes four Ubersaw hits to fully charge? Screw you injured losers, I’m off huntin’.
@Ev - what, when I’m disguised as a Medic? I wasn’t thinking of doing that - I’m looking forward to exploiting the drought of burly, injured patients to get a little more credulity out of these class-tourist Achievement-grinders.
5 Christopher // Apr 16, 2008 at 9:39 am
Hm, the new needlegun is gonna be a primo spychecker, provided the medic is injured. No more spraying needles — if one shot kicks your health up, it’s a spy.
6 Verdugo // Apr 16, 2008 at 9:44 am
Medics now seem like both offensive and defensive class–just what I would love to see in a class-based FPS.
7 Mrmong // Apr 16, 2008 at 10:01 am
im curious what the other classes might get, maybe a stronger sentry for the engineers for thee expense of ammo or somthin
8 ImperialCreed // Apr 16, 2008 at 10:09 am
Is there any kind of definite ETA, bearing in mind the Valve Time phenomenon of course?
They seem like fun, solid unlocks too. I already enjoy the occasional bout as a Medic, this will probably only make me play the class more.
9 Punjabi Fury // Apr 16, 2008 at 10:22 am
Niiice. Been playing a lot of medic recently in readiness.
Although, once these come out EVERYONE will play medic. Which will be annoying.
10 Trid3nt // Apr 16, 2008 at 10:49 am
What would happen if a medic ubers a heavy, then another uses the new gun? Super heavy?
11 Christopher // Apr 16, 2008 at 10:56 am
I gotta assume you can’t uber an already-ubered player. That would be ridiculous.
12 ImperialCreed // Apr 16, 2008 at 11:04 am
@ Chris: But isn’t much of TF2 inherently ridiculous anyway? I mean, the demoman is a black eye-patch wearing Scotsman for heavens sake!
13 Christopher // Apr 16, 2008 at 11:12 am
Sure, but it’s ridiculous like a fox.
14 ImperialCreed // Apr 16, 2008 at 11:13 am
Touche
15 Trid3nt // Apr 16, 2008 at 11:52 am
Or ridiculous like a ninja-brick?
16 chris12 // Apr 16, 2008 at 12:29 pm
well, guys… errr whats good with medic again?
17 mr. Brit // Apr 16, 2008 at 1:58 pm
surely it will be a walking sentry that only goes to level 2 not a stronger one, Mrmong
18 Pentadact // Apr 16, 2008 at 3:39 pm
I assume the opposite - that there’ll be no restriction on stacking Uber with Critz. The level of co-ordination and investment that this takes for one player’s ten seconds is huge, and ought to be rewarded. I also don’t think it’d be as effective as having, say, an Ubered Pyro run in and a Critzed Soldier give supporting fire from behind.
Conspicuous that there’s no achievement for it, though - that seems like an obvious one.
In either case, the Critzkrieging Medic is going to be a huge bullseye - his patient is super-powerful and medi-boosted, but the doc himself is no tougher than usual and twice as important to kill.
@Chris: That Vamp gun spycheck thing is a good idea, but presumably would only work when the Medic has sub-maximum health. Given that he can’t harm himself, and constantly regenerates, that’s not going to be the case for long if he’s hanging out at base spy-checking.
Maybe there’ll be a sub-cult of Vamp Medics on Badlands throwing themselves off the spire to keep their health spy-checkingly low.
19 Mr_Wizard // Apr 16, 2008 at 3:47 pm
Not to mention, with one using the ubershield, and the other medic packing an ubercrit, one of the medics is unshielded (And while you could uberswitch, remember it drains your charge faster. To really make it unstoppable for the full 10 seconds, you would need 3 medics, 2 with ubershield and 1 with ubercrit. That tactic, while possible, just doesnt sound as effectient as 2 medics uberswitching a pair of soldiers/demos for a rain of destruction that ensures nothing will be left to fire back. :D
I wonder if critical stickies stay critical after they have been fired and the uber runs out. that might be a huge plus for Demo’s.
20 some guy replying to chris12 // Apr 16, 2008 at 4:06 pm
the medic can heal himself over time, i always use him as my battle class as he can kill someone easily in a 1 on 1 battle, and then heal in between these little battles. if a large battle occurs he can heal a team mate and be useful, while attempting to not be killed. i like the medic for a generally good class and the soldier for when i am tired and just want simple playing. also, i am on the ps3 version which is limited to 16 people, so maybe the 1vs1 battles dont happen as often on the pc or xbox and the large battles occur more often, i wouldn’t know.
21 Gore-wrath // Apr 16, 2008 at 8:34 pm
WOW! Imagine someone using a critzcreig uber at the same time as someone does a normal uber, invulnerable crtting ftw!
22 Christopher // Apr 16, 2008 at 8:51 pm
That’s why I think they can’t allow them to both be used at once. An invulnerable all-crit pyro? No way. That’s game-breaking. It’s gotta be either-or.
23 Pentadact // Apr 16, 2008 at 11:47 pm
But like I say, surely that’s not as devastating as an Uber Pyro with a Critz Soldier in tow? When I’m Ubered, my limitation isn’t my damage output - I kill everything I can shoot at. It’s reaching all the enemies in that ten seconds. A Ubercritzed Pyro is still going to be knocked back the same amount by Sentries, and critical hits don’t do any extra damage against Engy kit anyway. Non-Sentry enemies can just run away, and none of the three can cap while their ubers are active.
Anyway, Ubersaw looks awesome:
http://media.1up.com/media/03/5/3/0/lg/263.JPG?r
I hope that syringe visibly fills as you hit.
24 Christopher // Apr 17, 2008 at 7:09 am
Oh, snap. Man, the first few people who turn up in game with one of those are gonna be celebrities.
25 Mr brit // Apr 17, 2008 at 9:05 am
@Chris, surely the ubersaw makes a better spy check? If uber fills it’s definatly a spy and you rarely have full uber for long.
26 Dave // Apr 17, 2008 at 5:55 pm
The items are cool, but they seem so out of place. All the items, characters and scenery in TF2 look so compatable with each other, but here comes the sleek, black gear. Looks awkward in the TF2 environments, like a different person designed them, or they’re making items to fit in with the TFC motif.
27 Pentadact // Apr 18, 2008 at 4:11 am
@Mr Brit: Ubersaw would certainly work, but then, if you can actually walk right up to the guy, you’ll know whether they’re a Spy no matter what weapon you’re using: you’ll bump into them. The Medic’s faster than the Spy too.
The advantage of the Blutsauger over standard Spy-checking methods is that it’d be virtually the only one that could be used effectively at range. Shoots further than a Pyro flame, travels faster than a rocket, much higher rate of fire than the grenade launcher.
Could work nicely if you follow a patient into battle, but play it safe. When he inevitably dies, you retreat, inevitably taking a few hits, and get to do some serious Spy-checking back at base while you’re there to refuel and pick up a new patient.
I have a feeling KritzKriegers are going to play more cautiously than Uberchargers once they get the hang of it, so that would gel well with this tactic.
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