Yeah I know, I never said that it would only be friends healing you, I included that by saying that it's not always true that just friendly medics heal you, it's somewhere in the paragraph. I'm saying that sometimes some people will have a perma medic just due to them being friends, hence giving them an unfair advantage which is not based on skill, hence there is a flaw in a point ranking system. Also sweet talking isn't really anything good in a game, it doesn't help the team it just helps you help the team more if you can sweet talk someone into being your permamedic, but it puts other teammates at a disadvantage, so overall the team is not massively better off (unless you kill loads but then I'm saying that someone of the same skill could do that if they got healed, and so they are seen as less useful even if they are just as good if not better than you). Communication in TF2 is about helping your team by giving them information, it is not about chatting up a medic

I never said skill was about hand eye coordination. I just said that getting a friend to heal you is not skillful but boosts how stats would see you as a skillful person (and it happens a lot on our servers and probably most other servers). Pretty much you're ignoring my point so I can't be bothered to argue

Pretty much medics are an outside source which cannot be incorporated into the statistics, so there is a major flaw with any ranking system. Can't be bothered to argue anymore because I've made my point :3

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a bird in a bird in a bird in a bird in a bird in a pig

Well... I've always understood what you're saying mini, but I'm still not convinced.
Because it's not like I'm really "sweet talking", it's more like calling Spies, Ãœbers, Coordinating attacks, motivating people to push the cart, get on the point and stuff like that. So I think it does help the team.
It also helps the team if I get permahealed, because that way I can suck up a lot of damage (like a "tank" in RPGs), which frees up the teammates to attack on the flanks.
And the friends you are talking about, are in my case mostly friends I met while playing TF2. And they don't heal me just because we're friends, but because it's the logical choice to do so.
I think the case that you describe where the healing is solely based on friendship and not around skill is very rare.

Feels good to get it off your chest yeah?

My whole point was based on the idea that a goosd player will get a medic and therefore be more of a team player. And disputing the idea that a medic is automatically a good team player.

Your right theres a HUGE difference between a good medic and a bad one and its hard to be a medic for a pyro. My problem is with the medics who ignore you because they're concentrating on 1 person. It may not be reflected in the score sheets wher a bad medic often does really well haging back by activating ubers on one or two people, ignoring everyone else, running from danger and leaving the people the were healing. That kind of behaviour oddly gets them very high up the score sheets (hence the point whores)... Its doesnt on the server stats and theres a reason both you and tpyo are so highly ranked. I'd also be more inclined to rant at you if you were healing me as I very really see you without crits', crits' on a pyro? Nah.

For the record the only time I now get annoyed with medics is if they only heal one person or run with you right up to the enemy and run away when you start taking damage.

I also get that being a medic is often a thankless task to which is why when a medic does heal me I try to say thank you every time.
If they're your friend they probably know how you play better than anyone else and you'll make a more effective pairing together. I still think the best medic for me is Tpyo we've been playing this since the beta and he often knows what I'm going to do.. i'll admit that often its suicidal but he generally knows where I'm headed and who my target will be.

Both of the sides of this are right. Any medic playing would be stupid not heal Demm or Mini as with or without the medic they're an asset to a team. What we're really talking about is how shit players effect a game and how better to reflect in the stats a good team player or a bad one. Everyone will have a very different opinion on this and will have a bais towards their own prefered class.

Oh and yeah Mini you are always with a medic. which only really frustrates me if you play pyro.

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I stopped caring about this thread ages ago.

Same with stats.

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'Belgium, a country with many homos also have a pedophile party as far as i know.' - Violetblood

xD Im getting pretty pro with the blowback now, kept on killing the same guy with his own rockets in 1vs1 situations, he must have been getting really annoyed

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a bird in a bird in a bird in a bird in a bird in a pig

Fair points Cardboard, and I was not personally having a go at you mate, just the whole "one minute medic's are needed for a team and the next they are stat whore's and useless" side of things.....a general I'm at work early and want to go home kind of rant. I do not play medic to go up high in the stats, if I wanted to go high in the stats I would set aside 200-300 hours of my time and play TF2 most nights. I play medic because I enjoy team work and I feel a good medic is required to win a map and like mentioned on a previous thread, (I think was Sebas) medic's are one of the most satisfying classes to play...keeping people alive and unleashing an Uber to wipe out half the team to push forward...no better feeling IMO. (in TF2 I mean)

....and I do heal you little Cardboard

...you see, this morning I am happier because it's Saturday

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You'll Feel A Little Prick

Hint hint...don't read the thread, post on it, or look at stats then

....maybe not that happy then

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You'll Feel A Little Prick

The problem I have found is that, as Demm said, that people don't have a clue how to play when they have a medic. Whenever I was healing someone they would run round a corner chasing someone, while there were enemies on the turning of the corner, then they complain that I left them (since the enemies cut you off and you don't want to run in to get 1 kill and suicide). This is the main problem with healing a lot of players since they are very aggressive but aren't very observational, or just don't care about the person who is being nice enough to keep them alive.

This is a reason I don't heal pyro's constantly as a rule because they don't know when to retreat, they want to run into the biggest group possible and they will often move onto different targets before their last target is killed in the big group, and the burning people target the medic, so you die. So mainly I just give them ubers, unless I get someone who knows how to use the airblast and doesn't make me do pointless suicides when I could've just waited for 30 seconds to get uber and done a lot more for the team.

I've also noticed that medics don't want to use ubers to save people, they would rather let 3 teammates die then use their uber to save them (since they are more likely to get more points if they use the uber to attack rather than defend).

So these are my observations from playing medic :3

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a bird in a bird in a bird in a bird in a bird in a pig

yeah i agree with moosey! i always seem to get stuck healing some idiot who leads me to my bitter death, or wastes the uber hitting a sg with a spade.

plus if you dont take care of the medic then why the hell should i take care of you, is what i ask myself when im playing that class, which tbh im playing less and less now as i just dont want the stress of 13 people all screaming for me to help them, getting healed then, running off to die pointlessly and more often taking me with them.

on the plus side... im rank 19 woooot! \o/

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-"You've really worked out your banter, haven't you?"
-"No, not really. This is a different thing, it's spontaneous and it's called wit."

I would say that people quite often do play better whilst they're being healed. aside from it being a case of numbers (they can afford to be more aggressive, they can take more hits giving them a bigger window of opportunity to retreat, etc), it's also a case of, if the medic's any good, he has another player covering his back, watching for spies and being in general communication, and all of that is a bit of a confidence boost. result - person being healed plays better. that's assuming that they don't go and do something stupid, like try to take on half of the opposition while my uber is nowhere near up (looking at you, pyros >_>).

this works both ways ofcourse. it's all very well saying that the person you're healing can't look after his medic, but the medic has got to be able to look after himsself at the same time. that means using cover, bringing out the blutsauger for a bit of self healing when necesarry, and knowing when it's safe to break cover, as well as being generally vigilant for sneaky spy's an pyro's... the list is pretty big and I won't go through it all. not to say that following around someone who you know is a noob is good medic practice either.

as for choosing who to heal - everyone needs to be kept alive as far as possible. having 3 less capable players alive is better than having just 1 capable player left standing when the shit hits the fan, so I always try to save the majority as best I can. what's far more important, imo, is choosing who you uber, going first by the class that's best for the job, then by picking someone you know won't completely mess it up. an uber wasted on someone that will accomplish sod all during it's duration is horrible, and if you follow it through then you're usually planted in among a load of enemies who want to blow you up as soon as the charge wears off, and there's not much chance of you escaping.

if you can't find anyone suitable? just go for a pyro and have him w+m1 everything in sight, then run out spamming the blutsauger leaving him to die by himself. or something similairly un-heroic ;D*

*disclaimer: this usually fails. badly.

edit: I'd better mention that when I say it's best to pick carefully who you uber, this applies mostly for when you've saved up your ubercharge for a determined attack - taking down a sentry nest or something of that nature. if you've ubered for the sake of survival and keeping yourself and as many others alive when things turn nasty, then it's a case of bouncing the healing ray on whoever needs it the most. switching targets while you're ubercharging causes your uber meter to run down a bit faster than usual, but for the sake of keeping the extra team mate or two alive, I feel it's worth it.

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ュ~ちゃんgamer.jp Pinky: true genius
ュ~ちゃんgamer.jp Pinky: doesn't make sense
ュ~ちゃんgamer.jp Pinky: till you're senseless

I swap between the "cower at the back" approach in order to get the charge up to break through choke points and the charge in to keep everyone else on the front line. My biggest issue is with the "player awareness" ( I swear some people are playing with a mic but with no sound - There's a scout coming behind us <INSERT NAME>. Still coming. THERE'S A SCOUT BEHI... too late) and protecting the medic. Getting wrenched to death by an engie or similar because the (several) combat characters immediately around you wanted to keep focused on the distant group they are attacking is not fun, particularly when they then yell at the medic for running off/stopping the healing they "needed". I do take some satisfaction that it is usually shortly after this that I can get the bonesaw out and fiddle whilst they burn.

Also people who flee behind the medic when an attack comes - with the medic on you there is a chance to tank it. Remeber you may have 300 -> 450 health but the medic hasn't and is not buffed!
Gravelpit in particular I keep havin to use my uber to put out people on Cap A because nobody bothered to watch out for pyros running up the back ramp.

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Dammit! My computer was set to U.S. English.
I tried to save a word document but accidentally blew it up instead.

Finding a good medic is hard when i played heavy yesterday(with my football helmet ) Althouht there are some really good ones out there....

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"Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving."