Air Defense + Demoman

[Firefox11]

Originally Posted by Peon

This is a very good point, that also applies to the Pyro a lot more than before. A Pyro can fly to cap points, with almost no difficulty, unless an SG is up. The Sniper can provide some air D for the Pyro, but he's mostly arsed against the Demo.

A JetPacking Pyro will cap 10% of the time against a skilled defense, due to the low speed he has and how predictable he is due to this. His chances go up to 40% with an SG doing a IC+Nade jump, higher if he just gains the needed height to get over the fence.

Originally Posted by Peon

Perhaps this would be a good role for the Scout to fill, seeing as a lot of talk has been about giving him more of a purpose, besides flag runner. I know a well timed Conc would screw up the air-Demo, but the odds of success would be low.

Problem is, you will dedicate only one player to do anti-air, relying in non hitscan weapon, while he is useless in direct combat, giving you only one less Defender.

Also Credge, Soldiers aren't suposed to airshot oncoming jumpers, but to boost them up when they are landing, not allowing the Offense the land on the CP. This is possible to do in TFC (5v5 on Palermo, all Soldier D on a .id server with .id members, used to play AvD. So no, it wasn't a match, but they know what they are doing), not in FF due to the CP area height. Again, lowering the CP area height Demos will be more effective in taking out jumpers. If you don't like that your Demoman is the responsible of the team result, either push to prevent the jumps or play Engineer and have a Dispenser on the CP with a detdispenser bind.

[Ihmhi]

As Solly, a rocket and frag will let me clear the church and go straight over it and land on the cap point for point 2... or just go clear up from the ground at point 1. Point 3 and 4 are a bit harder to just land on like that.

[RocKwell]

Make the HW an anti-air class with high knock back AC bullets. Not enough to shoot someone into the opposite direction, but enough to sway their air control and momentum where they're unable to land on at least a cap point.

edit: Make two modes to the AC: One that shoots them back and one that slows them down, like currently (kind of ) and TFC.

[Dr.Satan]

I think that you all are focusing on an issue that is caused by a deeper issue.

In TFC your options for an effective D generally were:

Solly
Demo
Engy
HW

In FF your options are:

Solly
Demo
Engy

See the difference? Now let's look at this deeper and ask "why are these effective options?"

Well:

Solly - Staple...shuts down the O, very mobile, all around great class choice for most circumstances.

Demo - Your last line of defense and critical to any effective D strat

Engy - Great as a 2nd to last line of defense (before Demo). Is not only mobile and destructive on his own, but add a reserve player (Sg) to pick up the scraps. In TFC he also had tele's which allowed for instant repositioning of your D lineup.

Fatty - A powerhouse class that could (with the right player) shut down a flag room. Fatty is like a walking Sg that has intelligence and reflexes. He can take out things in the air, on the ground, under water, flying in magic carpets, whatever! The skilled HW player was / is a coveted thing for all clans in TFC and by not having one you have essentially admitted defeat.

So on topic...the Air Defense is the job of the fatty and him being as weak and jacked up as he is currently...there is nothing to fill that gap. It is not the job of the demo and has nothing to do with him. This is the definition of the balance thing that is so sacred and needed in this game. If even one player's balance is shifted it offsets the entire game.

EDIT: Rockwell snuck in before me. He's on the right track IMO.

[dys]

^ Well said! bravo!