ZombieStalin: i am free tuesdays-fridays, usually i do things on tuesday and thursday but they aren't allways 100%. So the best days for me are either a wednesday or a Friday
[SpA]Scatterbrain: cool, noted
[SpA]Scatterbrain: the plan is to put the announcement up this weekend, is that enough warning for the tuesday/thursday after
[SpA]Scatterbrain: ?*
ZombieStalin: It should be, we usually plan to do the things like the day before anyways
ZombieStalin: Between the dates you've mentioned though I think i am busy on the Wednesday the 16th
ZombieStalin: but that might be the midnight release for star wars, so i maybe around, I wull have to double check and get bk to you.

[SpA]cecarrot: Definetely up
[SpA]Scatterbrain: cool
[SpA]Scatterbrain: all nights?
[SpA]cecarrot: a lot of them at least
[SpA]Scatterbrain: good enough lol

Cman: 18th 19th and 20th all work for me unless x-mas plans come up

[Pisnac say he can't start til 21:00; Friday 21:00 might be an option for us]

[Mac confirmed that the rest of the week should be fine]

[Wildblaze: usually fine apart from Saturday, will need to check specific dates though

I can't find a good overall/introductory guide to highlander, most of the information out there is in terms of either class-specific or map-specific guides, I'll link some videos/youtube channels below.

Some useful phrases:

The 'combo' - The medic + demo, supported by the heavy and usually the pyro too. The core of your team, these guys almost always play together: the medic provides the all-important healing and ubers, the demoman deals major damage, the heavy and the pyro work together to protect them and deny the area around them.

The 'flank' - The scout + soldier, sometimes includes the engi if he's using minisentries. The most mobile and flexible part of your team, can either work together to make plays and create openings for the combo or to defend the flank (areas that the combo can't protect by themselves).

Uber advantage - The % difference between the two medics' ubercharges. For example, if your medic has 80% uber and theirs has 30% then you have a 50% uber advantage. As you guys know ubers are all-powerful in highlander: if you're defending and have a 50% uber advantage then you're happy, but if you're at a 50% disadvantage then you want to seriously consider backing up as it will be very difficult to defend against an ubered team.

Numbers advantage - When you have 'numbers advantage' you have more players alive than the other team do (although knowing which classes are dead is imo more important than knowing how many are dead: losing your medic is almost always much worse than losing, say, your spy (sorry Dekar )).

For me, the most interesting part of competitive TF2 is about your 'gamesense'.

Having gamesense is being aware of the situation and being able to judge how best to deal with it, even if it's as simple as "we have to run away because we're 5 players down and at uber disadvantage". Judging something like that can be surprisingly difficult when you're busy trying to shoot people, remembering if the spy died recently, listening to mumble etc. Having gamesense comes down partly to understanding how the game works beforehand and partly to experience. (#1 tip - keep an eye on the killfeed in the top right and keep checking the scoreboard to see who's dead/alive.)

For example, say you're playing engi on the 1st point of pl_badwater. Their spy saps your sentry, the soldier spams it with direct hit and it goes down almost immediately. Should you try to rebuild the sentry in the same place or should your team fall back to the roof on 2nd point to try and get a secure hold there? If everyone else in your team is fine then you can probably afford to rebuild, but what if your demo dies? Or what if your flank dies and they're spamming your combo from the hill? Or what if your soldier manages to bomb their medic and force them to uber early? Any number of factors like these influence your decision making.

SpA highlanders don't usually get *that* complex (or at least whenever I'm on a team it's usually just a case of I'll work things out, call whether we're pushing or not and if I'm lucky someone follows me ) but you guys get the picture, there's a lot more to it than being mechanically good at your class.

Anyway, some youtubes!

Personally I got re-interested in highlander after watching casts of high-level games. I don't think they're the best way to 'learn' the game but they're entertaining and give you a flavour of the big picture. Blackout Gaming covers most of the EU HL scene. A good recent game is this one if you want somewhere to start:



Imo the best way to learn highlander is by watching high-level players. Be warned, most of the stuff below is really in-depth. Some of it stuff will be outdated, be careful with anything older than a year.

(Not actually nsfw)