Before I begin, I want to make a few disclaimers. First, there are players that are significantly better than me at Combat Engineer. Due to this, I invited two Platinum/Invite Engineers waxx and Grynn to participate. The former has countless seasons in the highest Highlander division, fighting against some of the best players of his time. The latter is one of Waxx's students who has risen to become one of Invite's most-intimidating Engineer players in his own right. They are fantastic combat Engineers and found great success in it through their many seasons.

Although I may not be at their skill level, I believe my findings will be of help to Engineers of all skill levels, I have not been able to probe absolutely every detail and information from their minds. What I do hope is that the contents of this work are thorough enough to provide a more than comprehensive roadmap to not only acquiring excellent mechanics, but using it wisely.

Lastly, this paper is more on the practical end of the spectrum compared to some of my other works. If you are interested in more-theoretical writings on TF2's Engineer class, consider reading my papers on unorthodox Engineering titled Bizarre Taxonomy.

On July 20, 2010, Valve released the Engineer Update introducing the Gunslinger: arguably the most crucial and gamechanging weapon to be added to the Engineer class. With an extra 25 HP and a faster, more disposable Mini-Sentry, Engineer’s mobility drastically increased along with his direct combat potential. It certainly was a breath of fresh air for any Engineer veteran. Instead of being tied to a pre-built nest, Engineers could afford to take more risks and become more active teammates.

In November 12, 2013, Sigafoo released his famous “FROM ENGIE WITH LOVE”

Engineer frag video, where he displayed the damage and combat potential of the Engineer in the highest echelon of competition. This video would change the way many Engineers looked at the class, and shifted the class’ focus from a support role into a combat class.

Since then, Combat Engineer has grown significantly, evolving into a subclass which emphasizes mechanical skill, map knowledge, and game sense in order to succeed. This paper’s main goal is to explain the ins and outs of Combat Engineering, and to help others understand how the best Engineers are as good as they are.

Before the bulk of the paper, it is best to define what a combat/battle/deathmatch (DM) Engineer is. It is an Engineer playstyle and method that revolves around and uses mechanical skill, damage output, proactivity, and increased mobility to apply pressure onto the enemy and support his team. This is a stark contrast to the stereotyped and mocked Gibus Engineer turtling in the Intel Room in 2fort and at least a somewhat strong deviation to the Engineer’s original design philosophy of a backline defensive support.

Although this manual is lengthy and detailed, the core idea of Combat Engineering is straightforward and rather simple: to be a support class with increased mobility that can put up some sort of a fight. Despite this, Combat Engineering is an important and potent dimension of the Engineer.

Combat Engineering largely covers what I call Dimension 1 (Damage Meta) of Engineer and I considered Sigafoo to be its pioneer. It is conceptually the simplest on its surface compared to Dimension 2 (Dynamic Meta) and Dimension 3 (Inverse Meta), but this is not to say that the methodology is ineffective. Combat Engineering can lead to amazing outbursts of glory that are virtually impossible with a traditional playstyle.

The simple concept is that the faster and stronger opponent has a strong advantage, and combatants should seek to obtain the biggest damage numbers and kill count possible. There is a reason why the numbers advantage is a consistent factor in warfare and why weight classes exist in martial arts competitions. A skilled and experienced fighter will struggle against someone who is bigger, stronger, and faster by a considerable margin even if the former wins. The core attributes of an individual or a fighting force is crucial because it permeates the entirety of combat performance.

Do not make the mistake of thinking that this is a thoughtless or stupid style, though it can be. It is one thing to have strength but another thing to use it wisely. Combat Engineering requires preparation both before and during the game. To maximize Dimension 1, the player needs to have a good understanding of the game, gamesense, and some proficiency and knowledge of other classes. In some regard, the Combat Engineer needs to be especially careful and calculated with his engagements. Because the Engineer is a fragile support class, competent enemies can more easily punish sloppy aim, poor movement, and foolish engagements compared to other classes.

When excellent mechanics meets experience, planning, and tactics, Combat Engineering ends up being a powerful playstyle that can do incredible amounts of damage to the enemy team - an aggressive and consuming fire that will surely burn into the memory of friend and foe alike.

What cannot be emphasized enough is that combat engineering is an important tool for well-rounded Engineers. This style of play fills many situations: payload offense, king of the hill, 5cp, and even certain defensive postures. It is also worth mentioning that one does not necessarily need good deathmatch skill (DM) to be a good Engineer. This means having competent aim, good movement, understanding of the frontlines, and proper responses to a variety of scenarios.

There are Engineers in both Casual and Competitive that can hold their own without superb mechanics. Even in the highest levels of competitive Highlander there have been Engineers with mediocre mechanics. However, an Engineer who wishes to master the class should invest a considerable amount of time and effort into DM, given its practicality and wide range of uses. There are Engineers in the higher echelons of play that do not possess great mechanics, but I must stress that this is the exception and not the rule. If there is a property that some of the greatest Engineers in TF2’s history have, it is excellent mechanics. Spamfest, one of the most prolific Highlander Engineers, for example, has more time on Scout than Engineer and managed to play Scout in ESEA 6s Invite.

It is also worth noting that anyone wishing to be the best Engineer they can be should focus on DM and mechanics immediately and give its development utmost priority. For one, DM is useful, especially considering that TF2 is, in the end, a first person shooter. The other reason is that DM takes a long time of consistent improvement and effort to develop. Simply learning the building placements and the meta spots does not take long. Improving your aim does. There is a reason why some Highlander captains confer the Engineer spot to a Scout friend. The mechanics are there. The baseline building placements and strategies can be covered in a basic map review.

Because of these reasons, learning DM is a long-term investment that will pay dividends.

This is arguably the most important part of this entire paper. This is because proper execution of everything else listed in this guide hinges on the assumption that the Engineer player has good mechanics to support it. Learning those mechanics takes a great deal of time and effort, and can only be learned one way: hard work. All practical concepts in parts after Part I will be merely head knowledge and will not consistently and sufficiently manifest into reality unless the player has excellent mechanics to support it.

I will divide mechanics into three tiers: Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary. Primary mechanics are ones that are absolutely required to be an excellent combat Engineer. Secondary mechanics are very useful to have, but are lower priority than the primary mechanics. Tertiary mechanics are good to have in one’s repertoire, but one can still be a legendary Engineer without ever learning or using them. While the categorization may seem self-explanatory to some, the division is there to prioritize improvement properly and to gauge the importance of learning certain mechanics.

Primary mechanics: aiming (flicking, tracking, predicting), movement
Secondary mechanics: surfing, air strafing.
Tertiary mechanics: bullet jumping

Although I would like you to read all of the content, if you are already familiar with what these mechanics are, then feel free to skip to the section Improvement Mindset.

The parts from Improvement Mindset and the rest of PART I will be about the improvement methods for mechanics.

Before getting to the ways to improve DM, we must first discuss the different types of aiming. I want to note that the types of aiming aren’t exclusive to each other and more often than not overlap with each other during gameplay.

Flicking is quickly moving and snapping the crosshair onto the target and does not require any knowledge of how the target is moving. This type of aiming primarily comes from muscle memory and instinct. It is difficult to master, but players who can land consistent shots while flicking are going to be exceptionally dangerous.

Tracking is a contrast to flicking as it consists of small adjustments to the crosshair’s position as the opponent moves. It is easier to do on slower and bigger targets, but it is possible on fast and small targets if the player is proficient.

Leading or predicting is when the crosshair is positioned where the player anticipates the enemy to be then firing. It is best to use leading when the opponent hasn’t seen the player or cannot do substantial harm to them.

Strafe aiming is a form of leading. It is when the player strafes and moves to line the crosshair onto the enemy. It does not require as much mouse movement and it can be quite easy to do. Its drawback, however, is that the player’s movement becomes predictable.

For the Engineer, the two most frequently used types of aim are flicking and tracking as he is almost entirely a hitscan class. Flicking and tracking are both effective aiming methods when it comes to the Shotgun and tracking is what the Engineer needs to make the Pistol effective. Strafe aiming will be useful on the Shotgun in some cases. While these are not necessarily combat engineering cases, leading and predicting can be useful when the Engineer needs to defend himself with the Rescue Ranger or firing rockets from the Level 3 Sentry using the Wrangler.

Flicking vs tracking heavily depends on personal preference. There is also a hybrid style of aiming, where the user flicks to lock onto the target and then uses tracking to stay on the target.

Clockwork, an Invite 6s Scout, has extremely smooth, buttery aim and is exemplary of good tracking:

Shrugger is another Invite 6s Scout and his aim appears more twitchy and erratic, but in the end relies more on flicking:

Both of these are legendary players with very few rivals and these videos are a great showcase of their unbelievable skill and power. Yet, these two players aim differently. It also needs to be said that there are players in the middle. Grynn, a DM heavy Engineer I interviewed for this paper, stated that he has a hybrid aim, using flicking and tracking when appropriate. All this said, it is wise to work on all types of aiming regardless of the player’s aiming style. Each type of aiming has a place in combat and it is best to have a good grasp of all of them. Fundamentals are important and helpful no matter what class or situation. It is recommended to practice these aiming types separately. In the end, an individual’s style will organically develop no matter what their aiming style is.

No aiming guide would be complete without some discussion on sensitivity. There is no recommended sensitivity, and determining what sensitivity to use largely comes down to personal preference. The best sensitivity is the one that works best for the individual player. Players at the top level have a wide variety of sensitivities. A good number of Invite Snipers have low sensitivity. Jay, who has played for FROYO, has an absurdly high sensitivity.

All this said, lower sensitivities are easier to work with. I would recommend lowering one’s sensitivity and testing how it works before raising it. Note that changing your sensitivity will take time to adjust to.

Movement refers to the process of being in full control while being as sporadic and unpredictable as possible in order to avoid damage. This obviously helps the player in direct combat, but it also indirectly increases uptime. A player can contribute more actions to his or her team if they are alive longer.

Skip to 0:32.

Good movement can preserve a player against an elite competitive player like b4nny. b4nny chases the RED Medic to their last, kills the Scout accompanying him, and attempts to kill the Medic. However, due to good movement from the RED Medic, he was able to stay alive for much longer. He did not just survive b4nny’s attack but also the attacks of b4nny’s teammates for a short period of time. In fact, b4nny didn’t finish the kill. Even though in this specific situation the RED Medic ultimately died without accomplishing much with his additional uptime, this same level of survivability will be useful in any situation. At the least, the RED Medic delays the enemy attack to his last.

Ultimately, proper movement comes from a mixture of muscle memory and game sense. It is an entirely subconscious effort. Because of this, it is a rather abstract concept. Engineers who practice good movement can avoid damage or aggress their targets without getting hit.

Despite the abstract nature of movement, there are some rules of thumb to keep yourself evasive and unpredictable:

1. Always be moving, even when the task requires the player to be more stationary such as upgrading a building. Under this condition, do small strafes by rapidly alternating between the A and D keys. Something bad will likely happen to the player if he or she is standing still. Always be trying to move.
   
2. Learn how to rocket jump and surf. These two require strafing that will subconsciously ingrain fundamentals.
   If you wish to learn bullet jumping, also learning to rocket jump, surf, and air-strafe can be an immense help.
   
3. Be conscious of your movement patterns when you are learning good movement, especially in isolated environments like MGE.
   This way, you can focus on how predictable your movement is in combat.
   While this does contradict point 1, even standing still for a short amount of time can be a viable way to be unpredictable, as competent players are almost always moving.
   
4. Be conscious and aware of any nearby and expected sources of damage.
   This way, you can best understand how to maneuver around it and react properly. This, along with good mechanics and movement itself will further increase your uptime.
   
5. Good movement has some correlation to proper positioning. Being at an advantageous position will make it easier to move and avoid damage.

I also want to note something quick about the crouch jump. This is jumping while holding the crouch button to jump up a ledge normally impossible without it. When done normally, the character takes some time to land. If the player releases the crouch button midair, the character will immediately start moving forward because it lands faster. This will keep up whatever momentum the player has and will save precious seconds.

This video by Abyss also goes in depth about movement. While the title is about Scout, Deathmatch, and aim, the core of his thesis is about movement.

Ultimately, TF2 is a movement shooter where players use their positioning and movement to evade attacks. The game is also known for being fast-paced. Because of this, it is unrealistic to perfectly track targets. Players are humans and not robots. In fact, it is actually inefficient to try perfectly tracking the opponent because having the crosshair constantly tracking the target can make movement predictable. Rather, the mouse should also serve as a strafing tool and not strictly an aiming tool. Exceptions are weapons that fire in a continuous stream like the Heavy’s Minigun.

Abyss coins the term “aim spectrum”, which is the area someone is currently accounting for in a fight. This spectrum is wider than the crosshair. Players do not account for and do not track opponents outside of this spectrum. Fluidity in movement is going to make a player harder to hit and easier to aim. This is because people factor in where their opponent can realistically move and good players will identify and adapt to their opponent’s movement patterns. Thus, people aim where they believe their opponent will move to. Abyss states that the best thing to do is offset the opponent’s aim spectrum by moving in directions and areas the opponent does not expect.

On the flipside, recognizing enemy movement patterns and taking note of what weapon they are using is a high priority. This information is crucial to determining what kind of movement and positioning would be the most beneficial in that situation. By doing this and accounting for the aim spectrum, one can and should use movement to continuously improve their position.

With all of these factors, Abyss states that good movement leads to good aim. He says “Move in conjunction with your aim, aim in conjunction with your movement, all while utilizing your environment to optimize your predictive ability.” With good movement and positioning, aim also improves since it involves movement-based prediction. By recognizing movement patterns, flicking and tracking to the target becomes significantly easier.

I recommend watching Abyss’ video in full. This is because he goes into great detail on the concepts and breaks down multiple fights where he applies this knowledge and gives phenomenal commentary. The Scout-specific information can also be applicable to Combat Engineer and learning Scout itself. This paper will discuss the importance of learning Scout later in this Part.

For something more esoteric, one could implement circle strafing into their movement. This is primarily used by experienced Spies to acquire difficult stabs on competent players who are trying to outstrafe and actively trying to avoid any trickstabs. However, the principles of circle strafing can be used by other classes to outstrafe, outflank, predict enemy movement, and avoid damage while maximizing it during fights. In an extremely condensed statement, circle strafing is “strafing in one direction and eventually getting a stab.” In the Engineer’s case, it is outstrafing and flanking the opponent.

I cannot describe the full concepts and details of circle strafing justice in this paper. Below are two playlists: the full circle strafing tutorial by CulRulDud and the condensed version by Ezra. The series by CulRulDud is the most detailed but also very lengthy, the full series totalling to 4-5 hours. I advise multiple watches and concentration when consuming it if you wish to understand and learn this genre of movement.

Circle Strafing Series: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLULV5kBmXoQjg58nznCoQTq9NFGyjxNjr

Circle Strafing Summarized: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLR0Ni6vlbZUJupzJOZYUqXT_qv04kVEms

Overall, movement improvement is a gradual and organic process. It is hard to notice any sort of growth, but it will come in time.

Surfing, as far as combat is concerned, is using enemy damage to propel oneself. Airstrafing is changing your trajectory as the character flies through the air.

Beginner surfing guide:

Basic airstrafing guide:

Combat Engineers should invest some time into these two skills, as they are important movement tools to use against the Combat Engineer’s most troublesome foe: the Soldier. Out of all the classes, Soldier is the hardest to 1v1 due to his reliance on splash damage which renders most movement techniques useless. The Soldier will be on the flank where the Engineer will usually be and so the Engineer will be engaged with him a lot. Surfing rockets in order to put extra space between you and an attacking Soldier can be a good strategy, given his lack of effectiveness at long ranges.

Surfing can also be useful against other classes with strong knockback, such as the Demoman. Engineer’s relatively lightweight compared to major damage-dealers like Soldier and Heavy allows him to better utilize surfing as an escape strategy.

https://youtu.be/yNJp2fEbjQE

A good DM Engineer can weave in surfing in combat for both defensive and offensive purposes. In this video, Grynn, one of the Invite DM oriented Engineers I interviewed for this guide, surfs the rocket of the enemy Soldier to fly away from him, then uses that momentum to strafe around a building to launch a successful surprise attack.

Jump maps and playing Soldier in general are excellent ways to learn airstrafing. Surf maps are also good to use, but not strictly necessary. An unusual yet useful method to learn surfing is to try to actively surf damage in a pub/Casual match. There is a lot of chaos in the turbulent 12v12 so there will be many opportunities to surf damage and airstrafe.

Bullet Jumping tutorial:
Skip to 3:29.

Bullet jumping is a movement technique where an Engineer uses the momentum gained by shooting themselves with the Wrangler to reposition. This is commonly done with the Mini-Sentry, as not only is the Sentry cheaper, but each bullet does less damage to the Engineer, leaving him with more health when he gets to his destination. The Engineer can move surprisingly fast when doing this. A player can also deploy a bullet jump faster than a Level 3 rocket jump.

This is performed by standing next to or on top of the Sentry and pointing the Sentry’s laser through the Engineer’s “eyes”. When this happens, the Engineer needs to crouch jump and open fire. The Engineer will fly upwards depending on the angle of the laser. To keep propelling himself forward, the Engineer needs to keep the laser pointing through his “eyes” and continue shooting the Sentry. Should the Engineer have a Level 3, he can rocket jump and combine it with the bullets to get further distance, but at the cost of a lot of HP.

There are two main starting positions when it comes to bullet jumping: standing on top or in front of the Mini-Sentry. The Engineer should stand on top of the Mini-Sentry to jump if the goal is to gain elevation such as climbing over a wall or getting on a higher ledge. Standing in front of the Mini-Sentry allows the Engineer to get a lot more speed, surfing, and covering horizontal distance.

Any player wishing to master bullet jumping or implement it into his/her play should have a good grasp of surfing and air strafing. This greatly improves the Engineer’s aerial mobility and maintains momentum in the air.

To implement bullet jumping into gameplay, first practice it offline, then try it in pubs, lobbies, and finally competitive games. It will slowly be placed in the flow of battle tactics and techniques.

This is a niche skill that has seen very little use, even in the highest levels of play. The only S-class Engineer that I know that implements this skill into their play is Spamfest, which leads to some flashy plays:

Spamfest Jump 1:

Spamfest Jump 2:


Here are some additional clips from a friend, Rh0mbus:
Rh0mbus Jump 1:

Rh0mbus Jump 2:

Again, learning bullet jumping ought to be relatively low priority compared to aiming, movement, and surfing. Players ought to learn bullet jumping when there is time to spare.

A very important thing to possess when it comes to improving in anything is the mindset. There is no secret shortcut. This doesn’t happen in days or weeks. Rate of improvement will depend on the player, but at its core, it takes a lot of consistent practice. There is no strict routine that I can teach, but what is important is consistency and constantly doing work.

Another thing to keep in mind with DM and mechanics is that there is no skill ceiling. You can always be a little better. One mindset to have is the desire and need to continue working on mechanics. People who continuously work towards perfection will overtake those who stagnate or stand still. There is always more to do. You can always get a little closer to perfection, even though perfection is impossible.

Consistency is also very important and will lead to great DM. Even Spamfest level DM is obtainable if you take it seriously. Practicing DM isn’t easy, but with enough patience and effort, you will start achieving results eventually.

The best DM improvement method can be summarized as such: pick up Scout, Sniper, and/or Soldier as strong secondaries. Any other helpful methods and tools for DM improvement are supplementary to this and/or used for warm up. I will go in detail and discuss the importance of working on these 3 classes first and then go over the pros and cons of other training methods. I want to emphasize that all of these improvement methods are good, helpful, and will bring results in some way. That said, the best training methods are subjective and it is recommended that the Engineer tries out as many as he or she can.

Here is how I categorize the two training methods for improving mechanics for Combat Engineer: Core training is what the prospecting Combat Engineer needs for the bulk of their training. Supplements are training methods that are helpful but should not take precedence over core training.

Core Training: pick up Scout, Sniper, and/or Soldier as secondaries. Seek to learn and master them. These classes are more mechanically demanding and reward better mechanics.

Supplementary Training: Go on training maps, other games, MGE, DM Servers, any game or PC activity that demands speed and precision.

Improving at Engineer DM effectively is somewhat paradoxical, as the best way to improve is to not play Engineer as much and instead focus on playing other classes. The 3 recommended classes to focus on are Scout, Soldier, and Sniper. It isn’t enough to simply play them, however. One must seek to learn and master them as well. Playing these classes in Casual and pubs are fine and are sufficient to improve on DM, but playing these classes in even half a season of competitive will yield great results.

The reason that this is an effective method is primarily because these classes are more mechanically demanding and reward better mechanics than solely or mostly playing Engineer does. Even with the Gunslinger, it is easier to hone mechanics on classes that are better designed for it than the Engineer himself. It is easier to get a feel for aiming and strafing on Scout than Engineer, for instance. Recall what I said earlier about how one can be a competent Engineer even in Highlander without superb DM. When it comes to the three classes in question, one requires good mechanics to excel. There is no avoiding it when it comes to playing Scout, Sniper, and Soldier. For the Engineer, he can get away with playing passively and still do well for his team.

Because of this, a player who spends more time playing combat oriented classes will have more quality hours of training than an Engineer who doesn’t. Team leaders would rather select a player with 500 hours on community Badwater and Upward servers than a player with 2000 hours on trade servers and “silly maps”.

The reason that this method is the core training for DM Engineer is that the best way to improve at TF2 is to simply play TF2. Other improvement methods are good, helpful, and used by any serious player, but in the end, one must play the game itself to improve at it.

Good players should also have a decent class pool and a good mechanical grasp on many classes. In playing those other classes, you improve your ability to play against them, which is particularly important for Engineer. The Engineer is not the best at taking fights, unlike Scout and Soldier, but the knowledge of what fights are suitable and the Engineer’s own limitations are critical. Knowing these limitations can give a good sense of what the Engineer's limits are, what he can and cannot do, and when he can overextend.

Overall, any good TF2 player should expose him/herself to all of the 9 classes. This is helpful for developing mechanics, gamesense, and to understand how the classes interact with each other.

Let’s go over what each of these three classes bring.

Scout Movement Basics:
Scout Aim and Positioning Basics:
Scout Basics (Clockwork):
Top 3 Ways to practice Scout Aim:
Maining Scout is an obvious secondary main for any serious Engineer player. He wields a shotgun and pistol like the Engineer does, but with minor differences. He is more mechanically challenging due to his speed and fragility. Due to this, most of the Scout’s mechanics translate well to Engineer. The Scout is more active in a fight and arrives at them faster. Lastly, the skills from Scout to Engineer transfer very well overall. He is an excellent class to pick and master ecause he needs quicker reaction time and precision to play.

Even strafe aiming transfers from Scout to Engineer. The Engineer has less capabilities and opportunities to do this, but strafe aiming is possible on the Engineer and also very useful. Fundamental Scout combat also applies to Scout. These are:

• Aiming for the enemy’s stomach. The shotgun fires in a cone and the stomach is right in the middle.
  
• Keep a good mid range from the enemy. This means the Scout/Engineer is far enough away to dodge projectiles yet close enough to do a good amount of damage. The Shotgun can deal 40-60 and even 80 if the shot is good.
  
• Avoid wasting Shotgun shells at long range if it can be helped. The Shotgun ought to have all 6 shells loaded whenever possible.

Scout in 6s or even HL is a heavy investment but can be very much worth it. Even half a season of 6s can be a mechanical boon if the player’s time allows.

Soldier seems like a strange secondary to practice Engineer mechanics, but he has plenty of applicable skills that clever Engineer players can get use out of. He will be in combat on a regular basis and will provide a good environment for the player to hone their mechanics.

The Soldier’s Rocket Launcher requires prediction to use, as the player must anticipate where the enemy will be in the next couple seconds. It is a higher realm and layer of prediction than the Shotgun. This will greatly improve prediction and will translate to hitscan very well.

One critical aspect of maining Soldier is that he demands good movement, surfing, and air strafing. Rocket jumping is a critical component of playing him well and any player that learns how to rocket jump and implement it into play will organically acquire good movement, surfing and air strafing. Playing Soldier with Gunboats equipped rather than the stock Shotgun will force one to rely on mobility to succeed.

Playing 6s soldiers is also a good thing to consider if the time allows. The format requires a higher level of mechanics.

On a more minor note, give the Original a try if the Rocket Launcher feels awkward to use. The Original fires from the center of the screen while the Rocket Launcher fires from the left or the right depending on the viewmodel settings.

Sniper is another great secondary main for any serious Engineer main. The Sniper is entirely a hitscan class, demanding an extremely high level of precision when playing him. One can think of the Sniper Rifle as a Shotgun with a single bullet instead of 10 pellets. Sniper demands excellent precision, speed, and mechanics to play well.

Some Soldier practice before Sniper can be very useful. The prediction required to play Soldier well transfers considerably to Sniper. There is a good amount of flicking needed to being a good Sniper and the layer of prediction from Soldier will be helpful.

There are some general guidelines for playing Sniper:

• Shoot enemies that cannot shoot back.
  
• Have a target in mind before scoping in order to greatly increase the chance of hitting.
  
• Understand positioning and have situational awareness.

Heavy is another potential Engineer secondary, though he is not quite as effective as the previous 3. The Minigun requires good tracking to deal damage and flicking to quickly snap onto new targets or quickly adjust for enemies moving unpredictably. Playing Heavy also gives the player a good sense of what happens during the front lines and improves awareness and positioning as he must be aware of dangerous threats such as Sniper and Spy. The last two classes provide a specific threat to the Heavy.

Family Business Heavy or “Fat Scout” is also an option. The increased clip capacity of the unlocked shotgun, Heavy’s slower speed, and his higher health pool makes it a more forgiving and beginner friendly experience for practicing shotgun aim.

One potential issue of playing Heavy for Combat Engineer DM is his lack of movement options compared to Soldier and Scout.

Training maps are TF2 maps specifically built and designed to train a mechanical skill.

tr_walkway_rc2 and tr_aim are well known training maps designed to sharpen a player’s aim. These two maps are excellent for novices to get a feel for how their weapons function or unfamiliar game mechanics. It can isolate and focus on important yet difficult TF2 mechanics such as airshots and headshots without other players interfering. Maps like these are great for training the fundamentals and more suited for newer players. However, they can also be used by experienced players as the fundamentals are important.

Despite the useful nature of these training maps, they are not perfect. Bots do not fight like actual players do, and even though their movement can be customized, their general pathing on most of these maps can be memorized with prolonged practice.

MGE is a map plugin where players 1v1 each other and the first to 20 kills wins. This is certainly a step up from training maps for a beginner. This is a fantastic warmup and an excellent DM and aim improvement method. Because these are against humans and not against bots, the more MGEs the player engages in, the more situations a player will be prepared to face in an actual match. The best outcome is possible when there is a lot of data to work with. The fact that there are 20 required kills allows the player to adjust to the enemy movement and aim. Players have their own styles and habits in combat, and MGE allows individuals to adjust to their opponent and exploit potential weaknesses in their game plan.

The issue with MGE is that it only trains 1v1. In most cases in TF2, 1v1 scenarios are quite rare. Especially for the Engineer, as he should not be taking 1v1s regardless. Players must be careful as MGEs are not a true representation of what a real game is like, both in pubs and competitive. The Combat Engineer should not make it a concerted goal to take 1v1s.

While the best MGE class for combat Engineers is the Scout, Engineer vs Engineer is a viable training method. Engineer MGE is mocked for understandable reasons, but it is akin to Scout vs Scout. The particular benefit for this is that it gives the player a good feel for the Engineer’s movement and honing mechanics.

DM servers feature 4v4 matchups with instant respawn, played on small maps. Most servers have 6s class restriction, as it brings the gameplay much closer to an actual match. These are highly recommended, as you are constantly engaged in constant chaos. This sort of environment is perfect for honing DM, and allows players to adjust to highly volatile situations on the fly. The same ideas and cons to MGE apply, but there is an added benefit of fighting as a loose team.

There are games/software that are designed and built to train the user’s aim such as Aim Hero, Aim Labs, and KovaaK. There are great merits to these not just for TF2, but other games. Aim trainers come in many different forms and MGE should be supplemented with these. Aim trainers have exercises that train specific types of aiming in different scenarios and with different requirements. They also keep score and do a good job benchmarking improvement. Aim trainers can also keep track of details such as accuracy and speed. From this, these games are suitable for any skill level.


In addition to aim trainers, one can play other games as training as well. Games that aren’t meant to be aim trainers can be used as such. osu! is a rhythm game where the user clicks on circles that appear on the screen at the proper time. Anything that times the player, has a deadline for moving the mouse very quickly, and demands timing and precision are games that can train aim.
Different games work for different people.


One extremely critical point is that when playing any of these aim trainers or other games one must focus on accuracy before focusing on speed. The important aspect is acquiring consistent accuracy before developing speed. Speed without accuracy means absolutely nothing. Once there is great accuracy with a certain speed, one can increase it. Create an excellent baseline for accuracy.


Note that if you are playing another FPS like CS:GO, be aware of the mechanical differences between TF2 and the game you are playing.

There is no shame in asking for help. Mentoring is getting a player who is better to guide and train to improve. Mentoring can be a breath of fresh air, as an outside perspective of someone better than you can be a great asset. Mentors can tell you what you do poorly, what you can improve on, and how to go about that improvement. Mentors can also tell you things you didn’t think of or thought possible. Because mentors are more experienced, they are able to transmit information that has already been established as TF2’s general meta and accelerate your learning. Having a teacher tell you the information means you will spend less time figuring it out for yourself. They can also be people one can bounce ideas, viewpoints, and suggestions off of.

Because of all of these benefits, getting a mentor can be a source of rapid growth. They do not have to strictly be someone who is playing competitively. While a competitive player can be better because they are in a higher standard environment, any player that is better can be helpful. Consulting multiple higher level players can be an excellent boon, because they can provide different perspectives and fill the knowledge gaps another mentor might have.

Note that the job of a mentor is not to deride. Their job is to nurture and provide guidance. Mentors are supposed to help the students along the right way. Sometimes the advice is harsh, but the best thing to do is to take it.

I want to emphasize again. You have to want to improve. You have to want to get better and be receptive to criticism and information. Be proactive. If there is no thirst to improve, there won’t be improvement. Again, even Invite players learn new things. The meta shifts. New maps get published. New strategies are unveiled.

As a parting note, mentoring is not for everyone. Some people can objectively evaluate themselves without outside assistance, potentially nullifying the point of a mentor in the first place.

It is almost a tradition and formality for TF2 class guides to have a part dedicated to a discussion about class matchup. But this is for a good reason, as class interactions are an extremely important part of mastering TF2. This part will discuss the combat Engineer’s matchup against all of the 9 classes.

While there are different rules to fighting each of the classes, there are overarching points every Combat Engineer needs to keep in mind. All points regarding rules of class combat have to do with the fact that the Engineer is a relatively immobile support class. His combat capabilities are inferior to what many of the other classes can do.

Firstly, it is unwise to take any 1v1 engagement. The Engineer should not be actively looking for a fight. As stated, the Engineer has very poor combat prowess compared to most of the classes in this game. The general exception to this rule is if the enemy has already taken a lot of damage or when chasing down a Spy. As for figuring out which enemies are hurt, listen to ally communication, if there is any, and keep a watchful eye on the battlefield for enemies at some sort of disadvantage. Keep in mind that the Engineer is a relatively immobile class that cannot easily retreat from a fight should it turn sour. The Engineer should preferably take 2v1s or better.

Building off of the first point, it is best to abandon your position and retreat to a safer area if the Engineer is alone. Many classes can pressure the Engineer out of his position relatively quickly with raw power. It is better to remain alive, regroup with allies, and work with them to retake any lost ground than it is to hold onto the position alone and die with little overall impact.

One last thing a Combat Engineer can do is to estimate and count ammo in the enemy’s clip. This applies to classes with single fire weapons like the Scout and Engineer but it especially applies to Soldier and Demoman where they have a long reload time. This can be used to find openings to engage certain classes. A Demoman with no pipes loaded and one Sticky in the clip is going to struggle greatly against any opponent. If possible, watch how many grenades, shotgun shells, rockets, etc the opponent fires and make a reasonable estimate and then choose to engage based on the information.

I will be discussing Engineer’s matchups in 1v1s and will also cover tactical/strategic concepts for team-based combat when applicable. Tactics in combat will be covered in more detail in Part IV. Generally, the Engineer should choose his fights very carefully. Communication is important and is a critical component to winning TF2 overall.

A Combat Engineer will sometimes engage with the Scout as both classes tend to be on the flank. Usually an experienced Scout will not be caught alone but instead be accompanied by another class. When fighting enemy Scouts the Combat Engineer will likely come into contact with Soldiers and even enemy Engineers.

A good rule of thumb against Scouts is to have a Mini-Sentry by the Engineer’s side. Almost all Scouts that realize there is a Mini-Sentry in the Engineer’s general area will not engage. If a Scout is confident enough to engage, then the fight is greatly in the Engineer’s favor. However, there are Scouts that are so frightening that they can rush in with overheal, eliminate an unprepared Engineer with two well placed meatshots, then either quickly dart away or kill the Mini-Sentry to boot. Any Scout receiving heals from the Medic is a threat and not even a Mini-Sentry will give a true sense of security.

For the most part, Scouts will simply run away if he realizes it is unwise to engage the Engineer. Higher level Scouts pick their fights much more carefully (unless they are particularly egotistical), as they have the speed to make that a luxury.

However, it is seldom that the Engineer will engage against a competent Scout 1v1, let alone under favorable conditions. With their great mobility and speed, Scouts have the luxury of choosing when to fight. Their optimal time to commit is when they are accompanied by other flank classes like the Soldier or chasing after weakened enemies.

Lastly, a 1v1 vs any competent Scout without a Mini-Sentry is quite heavily favored for the Scout. With his speed, damage, and relatively smaller hitbox, Scout has a lot of direct combat advantages over the Engineer. With a Mini-Sentry present, the Scout can still easily dispatch the Engineer, leading to a trade.

The Soldier is the most difficult class to 1v1 due to his innate qualities. He has a lot of health, splash damage, incredible mobility, and raw damage. All this makes the Soldier a formidable foe. Lastly, the Soldier will be a frequent enemy of the Combat Engineer.

The only time when fighting a Soldier 1v1 is wise is when the Engineer has the high ground. If the Engineer is on low ground, it is laughably easy for even novice Soldiers to kill him. A couple decently placed rockets will be more than enough to win the fight. When the Soldier is the one on the low ground, however, the Soldier must land direct hits to do any sort of damage. Under this condition, the Engineer ought to strafe and juke the rockets much like how a Scout would in the same matchup. The Engineer can also use the ledge as cover to retreat if needed. A major issue with this is that high ground isn’t always readily available. More often than not, the Engineer will have to engage the Soldier on even ground. If not accompanied by allied forces, the Engineer must keep his distance to the Soldier, do what damage he can, and then retreat if necessary. All this being said, even something as minor as props can be used as high ground to dodge the Soldier.


In this short clip, the Engineer managed to jump on top of the barrels and even a low ramp in order to force the enemy Soldier at the shutters to land direct hits. Using this, the Engineer was able to dodge, take some time to reload, and kill the Soldier in a few clean hits.

Note that not all map locations provide high ground to take. In many cases, the Engineer will have to retreat to safety if he is alone and the Soldier decides to engage. If the Engineer wishes to stay, he must create a crossfire with his Mini-Sentry, giving the Soldier two separate targets to kill. The Engineer should not Wrangle the Mini-Sentry in this instance. It is recommended that the Engineer remains far enough to not let one rocket splash both him and his Mini-Sentry. This will also waste the Soldier’s rockets. This transitions well to the next point.

An instance where the Soldier is very vulnerable is when he is out of rockets. The scenario when this is most likely to happen is when the enemy Soldier is fighting one of the Engineer’s allies. Another method is to Wrangle the Mini-Sentry and force the Soldier to burn rockets on it. The Soldier also has a myriad of non-damage secondaries, the Gunboats being a very common choice, especially for higher level Soldiers. A Soldier out of rockets is an opportune time to attack, as the Engineer can get a couple Shotgun shells into him before the Soldier loads a rocket and opens fire. Even if the Soldier manages to get a point blank rocket, he will likely blow himself up afterwards because he has already taken meatshots from the Engineer. It is also worth noting that a Soldier with an empty Rocket Launcher is vulnerable to any combat capable class. It is good to communicate to nearby allies that the Soldier is unable to fight back.

Excellent movement is a requirement to stand a reasonable chance against a Soldier. With good and unpredictable movement, the Engineer has the option to bait rockets from a Soldier. In addition, surfing and airstrafing are critical skills. The Engineer can surf defensively or offensively. Defensive surfing would be to surf the rocket damage to retreat and escape. The risky but offensive option is to surf into the Soldier to go for the triple meatshot and hope for a trade.

Due to the Soldier’s splash damage, it is also to the Engineer’s disadvantage to fight him in any sort of choke point or enclosed area. Retreat and wait for more durable classes to arrive before pushing in. In a more extreme case, the Engineer can take a couple of the Soldier’s rockets, leaving him vulnerable to a follow up attack from the Engineer’s allies.

If the Engineer needs to retreat from the Soldier, the fastest way to get away is to use the explosion from his rockets to surf and airstrafe away. Simply walking away from the fight is reasonable as well, as the Engineer has faster movement speed than the Soldier, but be wary of the possibility that the Soldier will close the gap via a rocket jump.

One thing the Engineer is very effective at against the Soldier is denying bombs. Bombs are when the Soldier rocket jumps into the enemy team to initiate a fight, follow up on damage, or be a living missile to focus down a priority target. It is one of the Soldier’s more useful moves. Denying a Soldier bomb is very simple: shoot him when he is in the sky. A couple well placed Shotgun shots will stop most if not all of his momentum. No Mini-Sentry is required for this. However, an appropriately placed Mini-Sentry is anticipation for the bomb can also hamper a lot of the Soldier’s airborne trajectory. If the Engineer is not close enough to do much damage with his Shotgun, a Wrangled Mini-Sentry will be more than enough to foil the Soldier’s bomb. It is also worth noting that in some cases, the Demoman will bomb with the Soldier as well. Neutering one of the bombing duo will be a major relief to the Engineer’s team while being a concern for the enemy.

1. There are a few ways the Soldier can telegraph a bomb.
   If the Engineer’s team has an Uber advantage or if the enemy team’s Medic recently died.
   To even the Uber and Medic odds, the Soldier will bomb for the Medic. The Soldier’s objective with the bomb would be to either force the Medic to use the Uber or outright kill him. In the end, the purpose is to eliminate or at least diminish the Uber disadvantage.
   
2. The Soldier has been silent, inactive, or is not seen frequently by the Engineer.
   If the Soldier is not engaging in direct combat, the most likely action is that he is preparing to bomb priority targets. These targets are most likely to be the Medic or the Sniper. The Medic is an obvious choice due to his heals, but it is important to protect a good Sniper. A good Sniper can rip apart the opposing team and a bombing Soldier is a good way to eliminate him.
   
3. The Soldier is receiving a large amount of heals from the Medic.
   Bombing costs health from both the blast jump itself and the fall damage. To survive the group of enemies he will be colliding with, the Soldier needs as much health as he can get.
   
4. See if the map has a lot of open air space and obstacles.
   While this is not a direct telegraph, it is something to keep in mind at all times. Lakeside is a prime example of a map like this. It has a lot of air and the point itself serves as an obstacle for both teams to hide behind. This makes it an excellent Soldier bombing map.

The Soldier will want to bomb towards an area where there are health packs on top of high priority targets and high ground. The Combat Engineer ought to take note of where the health packs on his side of the map are to anticipate the Soldier’s location and immediate needs/goals.

Frankly there isn’t much to say about fighting the Pyro. Experienced and competent Pyros mostly tend to stay by their combos, checking for Spies, airblasting any projectiles, and denying bombs so the Engineer will seldom engage the enemy Pyro. However, the Engineer is likely to fight the rare Pyros that are very aggressive, flanks, ambushes, and executes a combat heavy playstyle.

In a 1v1 situation, as long as the Engineer has a Mini-Sentry, any sensible Pyro will hesitate to engage. If the Pyro does choose to fight, combat is simple: kite the Pyro. The Shotgun combined with the Mini-Sentry will make quick work of the Pyro. The Engineer must also strafe while kiting to dodge the Pyro’s secondary weapons. The Pyro cannot run down an Engineer as easily as a Scout can. Even flank Pyros will have trouble fighting an Engineer with good Mini-Sentry positioning and aim.

If the Pyro does manage to catch the Engineer out of position and off guard, then the Engineer is likely dead, especially if the Pyro has excellent mechanics. It is possible to at least trade with the Pyro. A couple meatshots will be enough to kill the Pyro, if not come close.

If the Engineer’s team has used Uber, it is best for the Combat Engineer to focus down the enemy Pyro assuming the Pyro is not Ubered. The airblast will deny projectiles and knock the Ubered combo back, snuffing out the well earned charge. It is the job of the hitscan class’ to kill the Pyro or at least pressure them out so the Uber can continue uncontested. If the Engineer’s team has not used Uber yet but is gearing to use it, the Pyro becomes a higher priority kill.

The Demoman, at least in Highlander, will be a class that the Engineer will seldom engage with. He is a core member of the combo and thus will almost always be accompanied by the Heavy, Medic, Pyro, and sometimes the Engineer. In this case, it will be almost impossible to do any sort of heavy damage to the Demoman. Combine this with the fact that he easily lays waste to both the Engineer and his Mini-Sentry from a decent range and this means that the Engineer will have a particularly difficult time fighting him. All this said, if the Engineer somehow catches the Demoman out of position or by surprise, it is worth it to trade the Engineer for their Demoman.

There are a couple things the Engineer can do to fight against the Demoman:

1. The Engineer can use a Wrangled Mini-Sentry to pepper and harass the Demoman from a long range. During this, the Demoman can respond in a few ways. First, the Demoman can choose to directly fight the Engineer and his Wrangled Mini-Sentry. This is unfavorable because the Demoman needs to run towards the Engineer to get into favorable range and he will be taking 96 DPS from the Mini on the way there. Even when he manages to arrive, he must burst down a 300 HP Mini-Sentry. It is worth noting that the damage from the Wrangled Mini-Sentry isn’t guaranteed, as the Demoman has the ability to put out damage against targets that he cannot see. All the while, the Demoman could be focusing someone else on the Engineer’s team. It will ultimately be a waste of Stickies, something Demomen hold dear.
   
2. The Engineer can engage the Demoman during a teamfight and get close to him amidst the chaos. This can be treated as a Scout vs Demoman situation. Once a Shotgun wielder is very close to the Demoman, the former has a distinct combat advantage. However, this works under the assumption that you manage to get close undetected. If the Engineer is detected before getting into favorable range, he must retreat. The players surrounding the Demoman will obliterate the Engineer if he continues his pursuit and it will be a waste of his life as he will accomplish nothing. If the Engineer is at a reasonable range to deal good damage to the Demoman with the Shotgun, then it is all in. Combat Engineer for Demoman is an excellent trade.

I mentioned in the VS Soldier section that the Demoman sometimes bombs in. This is quite uncommon as the Demoman is a very powerful and crucial class and would rather be lobbing explosives than going on a bombing run. However, the Engineer can shut down a bombing Demoman the same way he denies a Soldier bomb: a couple well placed Shotgun shots, a decently placed Mini-Sentry, and or using the Wrangler. Here are the conditions where the Demoman will likely bomb:

1. The Demoman has not been Sticky-spamming for some time.
   This is the same idea as the Soldier hinting that he is going to bomb. If the Demoman is not actively seeking to position himself to deal damage or is currently fighting, then there is a good possibility that he is preparing for a bomb.
   
2. Crunch time.
   If there is crunch time such as an overtime on any map and the Demoman is nowhere to be found but is alive, expect him to bomb. In those situations, every second and body present counts and one can be assured that a good Demoman will Sticky Jump to get to the object as fast as possible.
   
3. Severe Uber disadvantage.
   Under the condition that the Engineer’s team kills the enemy Medic and there is a large Uber disadvantage, it is somewhat likely that the Demoman, sometimes alongside the Soldier, will bomb to even the odds. Having an Uber advantage is prime time for the Engineer to go to the Medic to protect him from retaliation.

Demoman can be tricked into thinking an area is clear by having his Stickies not hit anything. After testing the area with some Stickies, he could engage only to walk into a Mini-Sentry.

Lastly, the Combat Engineer should clear enemy Stickybombs when he sees them and not in a fight. This can save ammo from the allied Pyro and relieve pressure from any nearby teammates.

The rules of engaging the Heavy are quite similar to engaging the Demoman. Because he is a combo class, the Engineer will have a lot of difficulty even closing the gap let alone being able to deal damage.

There are a couple things the Engineer can do to fight against the Heavy:

1. As stated with the Demoman, you can zone out the Heavy by using the Wrangler to harass him from a long range. His Minigun will not deal enough damage to win vs a 300 HP Wrangled Mini-Sentry and it is foolish to sluggishly walk towards a 96 DPS source when there are more urgent tasks at hand.
   
2. In the chaos of a teamfight, the Engineer can close the gap to a Heavy and go for meatshots while the Heavy is distracted. This is still rather unwise. The Heavy has an incredible health pool and any competent Heavy will simply flick to the Engineer, spend a second shredding him, and proceed to focus on the main force.

In somewhat rare situations, the Engineer can go for a third consecutive punch from the Gunslinger that guarantees a critical hit. It is harder to track a strafing target that is directly in front of the player and in the midst of the chaos of a teamfight, the Combat Engineer might be able to get the critical punch against a rather unsuspecting Heavy before falling. This is still not necessarily a recommended procedure. Unless a Heavy is low on health, it is generally not a good idea to engage him.

The most an Engineer can hope to do to a Heavy in most circumstances is to harass, deal a massive amount of damage before going down, or a full trade. Trading for a Heavy is worthwhile if you can guarantee he will go down. Lastly, the optimal time to engage the Heavy is when he is caught off guard and in the midst of chaos.

I did not take the Combat Engineer duel seriously until I interviewed Grynn and wax. In fact, it is one of the two Engineer matchups that is determined mostly by skill. Assuming equal variables and no building, the player with the better aim and movement wins. If one of the Engineers already has a Mini-Sentry, he has secured his area and has a significant advantage over the other. The Engineer without the Mini-Sentry should not engage unless accompanied by his Soldier. Soldiers are better at combating Engineers and their buildings than Scouts are.

The strangest thing about this matchup is that the result tends to have a small impact on the flow of the game, assuming the enemy Engineer is also playing Combat Engineer. The most an Engineer is denying by killing the enemy Engineer are future Mini-Sentries and potential harassment. Even in a team fight, the Combat Engineer should be focusing on other, more immediately impactful classes than the enemy Engineer. The best time to kill the opposing Combat Engineer is before and after a major teamfight. As I will discuss later, the Combat Engineer shines in this scenario and, as stated, removing him before a major fight will assure that Mini-Sentries will not be present for a crucial engagement.

Fighting against a Level 3 Engineer is not an option, obviously. The Combat Engineer does not have the tools to reliably eliminate a Level 3 Sentry and a half-decent Engineer playing normally will not leave himself exposed in a way that leaves him vulnerable to a Combat Engineer. Obviously, an Engineer running Level 3s is a valuable target. Despite this limitation, however, the Combat Engineer has a powerful tool to use against Level 3 guns when opportunities present themselves. If possible, it is worth Wrangling a Mini-Sentry at the enemy Engineer or his Level 3 from afar. This is an incredible way to harass Level 3 guns, and will greatly contribute to the Sentry’s destruction if paired with teammates.

This matchup will be somewhat brief. It is very rare that the Engineer will be able to catch the enemy Medic out. The same logic from the Demoman and the Heavy applies. The Medic is a combo class that is very well protected by any semi-competent team.

Under the condition that the Medic is caught out, any Combat Engineer should be able to dispatch the Medic. The Engineer should not underestimate the Medic’s crossbow, as it can still do some damage. The most crucial part of engaging the Medic is not entering melee range. If the Medic connects even one Ubersaw and manages to escape or the Medic’s team reinforces and kills the Engineer, the Combat Engineer has put his team at a severe disadvantage.

There is not much an Engineer can do against a competent Sniper. The range is the main reason why the Engineer is so helpless against him. The best rule of thumb for this matchup is to be constantly aware of the Sniper’s whereabouts and to avoid peeking at any sightlines, as the Engineer cannot reliably get to the Sniper on a regular basis.

A more active thing that the Engineer can do is to harass the Sniper with long range Wrangler Mini-Sentry fire or Pistol spam to both throw off the Sniper’s aim or to distract him. Taking damage jerks the Sniper’s crosshair and even though incredible Snipers are used to this and can still land headshot after headshot, it is still valuable to do when possible. However, vs excellent Snipers, this may not be worth doing. It is too high of a risk for too little of a reward. To optimize this, the Engineer should harass when the Sniper is not focused on the Engineer.

A situation where the Engineer has an advantage against the Sniper would be if the Sniper overextended and thus within reasonable Shotgun range for the Engineer. The Engineer can even end up behind the Sniper. However, this is common if the enemy team has already taken a considerable amount of ground. If the Engineer is to find the Sniper in this condition, he will likely be accompanied by his team and it also means that the Engineer’s team is on the backfoot to begin with. Nonetheless, it might be best for the Combat Engineer to go for the Sniper. This not only potentially lands a pick, but buys the rest of his team enough time to safely retreat and regroup without having to worry about getting one-shot.

While not a direct combat rule, what the Engineer can do is to serve as a sacrificial role in a teamfight, literally taking the bullet for the Medic, Demoman, or Sniper. Taking the hit for the team can very well buy the small window of time for the more powerful members of the team to get to safety or the Engineer’s own Sniper to win the duel. It is also worth noting that presenting the Sniper with more people to hit means that there is less chance that more important classes will get shot.

An Engineer can also take matters into his own hands and use the Wrangler to bullet jump to an isolated Sniper to pick him off. This can be effective due to both the surprise factor and that the Engineer will land in lethal Shotgun range. Despite the obvious tactical upsides of bullet jumping, it is a niche and ultimately situational tool. Not only is this technique difficult to master, but it can only be used on certain maps, dramatically limiting its true effectiveness..

Regardless of any combat scenario, a good Sniper can easily kill the Engineer with a quickscope. wax talked to some high level Snipers and what he discovered was that these Snipers find the Engineer the easiest class to headshot. The Engineer is the shortest class and his head is clearly exposed. While it seems humorous, he has the largest head to body ratio. Many other classes have both small heads and are less likely to have their heads exposed due to their general posture.

If the Engineer manages to somehow catch a competent enemy Sniper, it is worth going for the pick, even if it costs the Engineer’s life. A great Sniper can rip apart the enemy team so this an excellent trade to make. The Sniper remaining alive can determine if the Combat Engineer's team stays put or pushes out.
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I mentioned in the Engineer vs Engineer section that it was one of the two matchups that is determined mostly by skill. This is the second one. Both are light classes that deal similar amounts of damage to each other. In most cases, assuming even skill level, it is a 50-50 tossup. It is also a matchup that is rather common to the Combat Engineer. Despite the Combat Engineer taking a more active role in combat, he is still a support focused, backline class at his core and the Spy sneaks in the enemy backlines to communicate enemy position and go for key picks.

In order to limit Spy’s effectiveness outside of direct combat, practice standard Spychecking protocols. Spycheck every ally with no exceptions. Shoot the Shotgun at corners, on top of props, and any place where a Spy may be cloaked and waiting. Always keep in mind that the Spy’s best time to strike is when his targets are occupied.

The Spy will often not go for a combat Engineer but rather a more important class like the Medic, Demoman, Heavy, or Sniper. The Medic is an obvious choice due to on-demand healing and the Uber. Demoman and Heavy have an immense amount of damage to facilitate a push. The Sniper can shut down an entire sightline and pick off important classes. These are all attributes that the Combat Engineer does not have relative to the aforementioned classes. If the Spy is nowhere to be found, the Engineer is bound to run into him when protecting a higher priority teammate. Even though the Pyro has excellent anti-Spy measures, he has another important job to do, which is airblasting projectiles and denying Ubers. During times like this, it falls on the Combat Engineer to be the spychecker of the team. An effective way to protect allies is for the Combat Engineer to position himself between common or anticipated Spy decloak spots and the line of attack to the back of his allies. It is important that the Combat Engineer does not do this when it makes him the furthest person on the back by a considerable margin, as he could be picked off, giving the enemy team potential breathing room.

A very important point to make about fighting against the Spy is to respect and fear the stock Revolver. 3 hits from that gun at mid range will kill the Engineer and the Spy can take those 3 shots before the Engineer can fire 2 from his Shotgun. In addition, the Revolver has a consistency advantage over the Shotgun because the former fires single bullets while the Shotgun fires a cone. While an Engineer must be wary of a good Ambassador Spy, the consistency offered by the Revolver is simply better in most confrontations in the hands of any competent Spy. Proficient gun Spies can pester the Engineer’s team from the back with the Revolver if a backstab opening is not readily available. If the Engineer realizes that he is dealing with such a Spy, he can patrol the backline vantage points for the Spy preparing to make this play.

The Combat Engineer will have an easier time directly fighting Spies that run L’Etranger. However, such Spies will not have a scrappy playstyle to begin with. He will either bide his time or simply cloak away if he finds himself in a fight. The Enforcer is also quite uncommon to face, as Spies will run it to pierce the Wrangler shield on a Level 3 Sentry Gun. Directly fighting an Enforcer Spy should not be as bad as the Revolver, as while the Enforcer does more damage when disguised, it has a slower firing speed than the stock.

It is generally unwise for the Engineer to engage in a melee fight against the Spy if he is out of ammo in his Shotgun. Any experienced Spy will trickstab the Engineer and the inconsistency of the hitboxes and what the game considers the player’s “back” makes meleeing the Spy a risk too high for too low a reward. It is better for the Engineer to keep his distance, reload a couple shells into the Shotgun, and try again rather than attempting to punch the Spy. Even shooting the Spy with the Rescue Ranger is preferable.

Lastly, the Spy has a skinnier hitbox and higher movement speed than seven of the nine classes, making him comparably difficult to hit compared to a class like the Heavy. Spy’s thin frame and slippery movement requires the Engineer to act with more precision than he would against most classes. However, given that the Engineer is rarely isolated, Spy’s opportunities to engage a lone engineer are limited. As a result, true 1v1s between these classes are frequently over in an instant, with player mechanics and positioning frequently determining the victor. As stated, this matchup is one of the two determined primarily by skill.

A guide on combat Engineering would not be complete without discussing the weapons in the Engineer’s arsenal. I will state that I will not be going over every single weapon nor will I be equally detailed with all the listed ones. Not every weapon is suited for Combat Engineer and many of them actively hurt his ability to directly engage the enemy.

I will say that there is one loadout that is a go-to for the Combat Engineer: Shotgun, Wrangler, Gunslinger. These weapons will be covered in more detail as they come, but I will quickly summarize why.

The Shotgun is a consistent, well-rounded, and reliable source of damage. The Wrangler is an excellent utility secondary in that it gives the Engineer the ability to tank the Mini-Sentry and the ability to do long range sustained damage. The Gunslinger provides the cheaper and faster Mini-Sentry and the extra health that makes the Combat Engineer what he is: a mobile support class with some punch. With that, let us go over the primary weapon of this loadout.

A Combat Engineer cannot go wrong with the stock Shotgun. As stated earlier, it is consistent, reliable, and possesses no clear downsides. By fighting at midrange, the Engineer can consistently land 40-60 damage hits while also staying far enough away to dodge incoming projectile weapons. It is important for the Combat Engineer to have the ability to retreat due to his lack of bulk and on-demand mobility tools. The Engineer should avoid damage whenever possible, as he usually does not have heal priority. This will take pressure off of the ally Medic who would much prefer to heal classes like the Demoman or the Heavy. If the Engineer is not midrange, then he should be content with doing chip damage without expending too much ammo.

I want to quickly talk about reloading. Generally speaking, it is better to fire off the remaining shells in the clip rather than to obsessively reload. Reloading is best done in downtime. The more desperate the situation, the more pressing it is for the Engineer to fire the remaining shells. Even if the Engineer has even 1-2 shells in the Shotgun, if a Soldier decides to bomb the ally Medic, the Engineer ought to open fire instead of reloading. Because the Engineer is not necessarily built to fight, getting in damage quickly is more important than getting in a lot of damage over time. He does have the ability to do sustained damage with the Wrangler and the Pistol, but this idea of dealing burst damage instead of sustain damage is pertinent to the shotguns. The Engineer is a class that is reliant on teamfights and is better suited to contain threats. The Shotgun can be reasonably filled with good time management in downtime.

The Frontier Justice is a very powerful sidegrade to the stock Shotgun and is quite a common alternative. The Frontier Justice’s guaranteed Crits can quickly swing the tides of battles and turn the Engineer into one of the most menacing close range classes in the game. With these attributes in mind, many players choose the Frontier Justice because its powerful upsides make up for its unreliability.

Recall back in Part I when I mentioned that the Engineer must have excellent DM for much of the following information to be practical. The Frontier Justice greatly embodies this notion. If the Engineer does not have Crits and misses even one shell on a close range enemy, the Engineer is in trouble. In addition, the Frontier Justice’s Crits will not live their full potential unless the Engineer has excellent aim. If Crits are off the table, the Engineer should just switch back to Shotgun. The half clip size makes the Frontier Justice inferior to the Shotgun in most situations.

The best time to switch to the Frontier Justice is when the Engineer is dead, waiting to respawn, and the Mini-Sentry has acquired assists and/or kills. This way, when the Engineer is back on the battlefield, he can be assured that he will have Crits at least in that life and is already getting value from the unlock. It is generally unwise to run the Frontier Justice full time because there is no guarantee that there will be a consistent influx of kills and assists on the Sentry. However, the Engineer does not need to switch to the Frontier Justice only when the conditions mentioned at the beginning of this paragraph are met. When playing against a rather aggressive team, it can be worth it to run the Frontier Justice for longer. The enemy will come into the Mini-Sentry more frequently allowing the Mini-Sentry to rack up kills and assists on its own. In fact, even one very aggressive player on the enemy team could warrant running the Frontier Justice for longer than originally planned.

The best time to swap back to the Shotgun is when the Engineer is dead, waiting to respawn, and does not have a Mini-Sentry or a Mini-Sentry without any kills/assists on the board.

When the Engineer does not have Crits, it is best for him to stay back and play defensively and wait to acquire Crits. Mini-Sentries can also be placed in more aggressive and hidden positions to better ensure that the Mini-Sentry will do damage and hopefully assists and kills before being destroyed, but any competent Combat Engineer should not overly rely on this. Another method of acquiring Crits is to “finish” opponents off with the Wrangler. This is when the Engineer stays a considerably far distance away with the Mini-Sentry and uses the Wrangler to pepper enemies from afar. Over time, the Sentry will pick up bodies, giving the Engineer the Crits he desires. He can later build a new Mini-Sentry close to the main fight and engage with Crits in his pocket. A Crit-loaded Frontier Justice alongside an aggressively placed Mini-Sentry can be a nasty combination.

The Pistol is a logical secondary to the Frontier Justice to make up for the -50% clip size. In more prolonged fights where all 3 of the Frontier Justice’s shots are expended, the Engineer can switch the Pistol to deal significant amounts of damage to any remaining enemies. The Pistol can also conceal the Crits and gives the Engineer the ability to directly fight and deal damage from a respectable range if he believes that using Crits in the current situation is a waste or wishes to continue concealing them. However, this does deprive the Engineer of the Wrangler. I will discuss the benefits of that secondary in its respective section. The lack of a Wrangler can still be an issue, as a Wrangled Mini-Sentry is a powerful ranged attack that can cover the short-range of the Frontier Justice.

The guaranteed Crits can be inconsistent, but are very versatile and rewarding. Let’s go over all of the ways they can be used.

• Burst Damage: Assuming that the Engineer has at least 3 Crits and a full clip, he can deal a staggering 540 damage if all pellets hit. In the middle of the fight or when flanking, he has the power to unload this damage quickly into any target he wishes, quickly deleting even higher health targets like the Heavy and the Soldier if he can get close enough.
  
• Picking/sacrificing: With the ability to deal 180 damage in one shot, the Engineer can swoop in and assassinate unsuspecting players or a high priority target. With the stock Shotgun, a Medic will die in two clean meatshots. Good Medics will react accordingly when hit with significant damage and competent allies can respond before the Engineer can get a second clean shot off. With a Frontier Justice Crit, the Medic will die instantly.
  
• Extended Range/Sniping: This comes from the fact that the critical hits do not suffer from damage falloff. With this, the Engineer becomes lethal from a much longer range. Those 40-60 damage midrange stock Shotgun blasts suddenly spike up to the low to mid 100s. Even if the target doesn’t die, dealing more than 100 damage from that range will be more than enough damage for an ally to finish the job or force the victim to retreat. The Engineer can also “snipe” enemies from afar. Even if 3 out of 10 pellets hit, the Frontier Justice deals 54 damage. This can accentuate and supplement damage dealers like the Demoman or Sniper who can deal a lot of damage at once, but can have trouble at times doing that extra bit of damage to finish the target off.
  
• Zoning/Area Denial: The Frontier Justice telegraphs that it has Crits with its shining model. While this may be a downside in some cases, it can be used to the Engineer’s advantage. By communicating to the enemy that the Engineer has Crits, some enemies will be more hesitant to engage or aggress. Sometimes the best thing to do with the Crits is to not use them at all. If the Engineer has shown that he can deal massive damage and has excellent mechanics, his mere presence with the Crits can serve as a form of area denial all on its own, even when he is alone.
  
• Soft Redirection: Bigger threats are higher priority targets and by obtaining guaranteed Crits, the Engineer turned himself into such an entity. With this sudden increase in power, some enemies will prioritize the Engineer more, as if he dies, all the Crits are lost. This can be used to the Engineer’s advantage, as he can redirect the attention and priority of some members of the enemy team.

Because of how limited Crits can be on the Frontier Justice, the Engineer must be careful when using them to maximize their effectiveness. If the Engineer cannot get a good angle of attack, is alone, or there is not a fight happening, it is best to use the Crits for zoning and soft redirection. If the flank routes are open, the Engineer can go for a pick. If there is a high priority target that needs to be taken down, he can go for a sac. In the middle of combat, he can maintain his distance and go for longer range damage. When noticing allies dealing heavy damage to some enemies, the Engineer can attempt to go for a snipe. If there is a chaotic teamfight, then the Crits can be used for sudden burst damage.

This is a rather niche weapon with some viable scenarios where it can be powerful, but it suffers from some issues. Because this weapon doesn’t need to reload, some Combat Engineers love the Widowmaker due to its potential to deal a constant stream of damage. This notable benefit has the possibility of offsetting its glaring downside of using the Engineer’s Metal for ammo. However, the Widowmaker suffers in competitive play because opponents generally have more awareness and skill, shutting down the Engineer before he can make any major plays with the weapon.

There are three main weaknesses to the Widowmaker:

1. Limited chip damage.
   Because the Widowmaker consumes 30 Metal per-shot and returns any damage dealt as Metal, applying chip damage is no longer a technique the Engineer can rely on. Chip damage is an important part of an Engineer’s game plan but the Widowmaker’s mechanics make this unviable. Doing 10 damage per shot means that the Engineer will run out of Metal quickly. Not only will this render the weapon useless, but the lack of Metal will mean that the Engineer will be unable to repair, upgrade, or construct any buildings.
   
2. Limited building and upgrading. Decreased utility.
   This is by far the biggest detriment to the Combat Engineer and will be the most common reason for not running this weapon. As mentioned in the previous point, an Engineer using the Widowmaker will have less resources to tend to his buildings. Even placing a Mini-Sentry halves the Engineer’s immediate damage output because if the Engineer has 200 Metal and suddenly needs to build a Mini-Sentry, he will now have 3 Widowmaker shots on hand. Unless the Engineer has a semi-reliable source of Metal, be it from the Dispenser or from the map itself, he will have a difficult time even placing new buildings let alone upgrading them. The Engineer must spend more time running and gunning rather than building and upgrading.
   
3. Limited Spychecking.
   Being vigilant of Spies is a skill any player must have. Shooting corners, hiding spots, and any “allies” are good habits, especially for the Engineer. While the other classes are busy doing their jobs, it sometimes falls on the Engineer to patrol for Spies. Any experienced player knows that one backstab from a Spy can change the course of the game. More often than not, a Spychecking Shotgun blast does not land on an actual Spy and because of the Widowmaker’s mechanics, this means that Spychecking will be much more difficult. In addition, shooting a disguised Spy with the Widowmaker will return no Metal. However, shooting a cloaked Spy will return Metal. If the Engineer predicts the Spy’s movement, it is possible to shut him down as he attempts to flee.

Despite these downsides, the Widowmaker can still succeed in the right situation. The Engineer should switch back to the stock Shotguns when these optimal situations are over:

1. Offensive Payload.
   Because the cart is an infinite source of Metal, it offsets the Widowmaker’s metal hunger. After the Engineer has deployed all of his buildings and is not in combat, the best thing to do is to sit on the objective. The Widowmaker can continuously fire for a prolonged period of time when the Engineer is simply pushing the cat. He still needs to take some precautions, however. It is not uncommon for the cart to be pushed far enough to the point where it cannot be pushed any more without being heavily contested by the defending team. The Engineer still ought to consider how ammo rich certain areas of the map are. In anticipation of this the Engineer should either switch off of the Widowmaker on death if there is not enough Metal on the map or can build a Dispenser early to hoard Metal.
   
2. Crunch time.
   The Widowmaker can shine in situations where burst damage is preferred to sustained damage, such as at the end of a round. Because the Widowmaker does not need to reload, it is easier for the Engineer to maximize his damage output in a short period of time. Assuming that the Engineer has 200 Metal before he begins to fire, all he needs to do is deal at least 10 damage with those 6 shots to gain a 7th one, as 6 shots will take 180 Metal total. That extra shot gives the Widowmaker more burst-damage potential than the stock Shotgun in time-sensitive situations.

One risky use for the Widowmaker is to maximize midrange damage output. Recall that the optimal way to play with shotguns is to stay at midrange for 40-60 damage shells. This makes up for the cost of 30 Metal per shot. A Combat Engineer can greatly extend his presence in direct combat as he would no longer need to reload. However, keep in mind that the Engineer’s uptime in combat is still limited by his fragility and relatively low mobility.

While the Pistol is a strongly recommended secondary to pair with the Widowmaker due to how quickly this shotgun can run out of gas, the Wrangler is still a viable secondary. I will discuss the Wrangler later, but because of how powerful that secondary is in both power and utility, it can more than make up for the lack of a backup weapon.

It is also not recommended to use the Widowmaker’s mechanics as the Engineer’s primary source of Metal due to how fragile and weak the Engineer can be in direct combat, especially against power classes. Any dead enemy or ally will give 100 Metal as a medium ammo pack anyways.

On a last short note. Using the Widowmaker could be another factor in Dispenser placement, as the Engineer now likely needs a constant stream of Metal. The Engineer might need to place it more towards his desired area of operations and farther away from classes that could need it more. The Combat Engineer must ask if this sacrifice is worth the potential increased damage output.

This is the Pomson 6000. Do not use it. Are there any other questions?

The Pomson is a weapon with many problems and no serious traditional Combat Engineer should run it at all. The projectiles are too slow, they don’t penetrate, the laser hitbox is inconsistent, and its damage is mediocre. There are a couple specific situations where the Pomson can be used:

1. Long and tight hallways.
   In this map geography, enemies will find it difficult to dodge the beams.
   
2. Medic harassment.
   This rarely happens, but it does occur once in a blue moon. If both Medics are at equal Uber, it is possible that the Engineer can drain a small fraction of the enemy Medic’s Uber before the exchange occurs, leaving your team the opening to kill the enemy Medic as he can no longer activate the Uber to save himself.

If it wasn’t evident by what I said, I’m grasping for straws… The Pomson is an underwhelming weapon to say the least and anything else would be a suitable alternative to the laser gun.

The Panic Attack, at least in my experience, has been a rather polarizing weapon, with passionate advocates and opponents. I will try to be as objective as possible and discuss the strengths and weaknesses of this weapon, both general and niche.

The major issues with the Panic Attack comes from the increasing successive bullet spread, less damage per pellet, and the rectangular pellet pattern. Recall that an appropriate distance for the Combat Engineer is midrange where he can be far enough away from the enemy to escape or dodge attacks while staying close enough to deal damage. Because of the listed downsides, the Panic Attack suffers when at Engineer’s preferred fighting range. This is quite problematic. To maximize the damage advantage of this weapon, the Engineer must place himself close to the enemy and therefore in a more dangerous position. For the Engineer, the Shotgun’s consistent midrange damage is both safer and more practical than the Panic Attack’s impressive short range capabilities. The Combat Engineer should live to fight another day than to go for a few meatshots before dying. Essentially, the Panic Attack is inconsistent at most ranges.

Although the Panic Attack has 20% less damage per pellet, the +50% more pellets increase the meatshot damage of the Panic Attack to be greater than even the Scattergun’s. This makes the Panic Attack a suitable weapon for close encounters. If the map or certain areas of the map are cramped or designed in a way that discourages midrange combat, then the Panic Attack can be a good option to maximize damage. All this considered, the Panic Attack’s close-range damage bonus is relatively small and may not be worth the gun’s midrange inconsistency. Any class the Engineer can 2 shot with the Panic Attack, he can already do with the Shotgun. The exception to this is the Soldier, but if the Engineer is that close, then he is likely dead.

In addition, as a fringe use case, the Panic Attack is an option when sacrificing with bullet jumping. The fast weapon switch in this case is also a bonus, as the Engineer will be switching from the Wrangler to his primary as he speedily lands next to his target. It is still worth noting that bullet jumping is a niche tactic and using the Panic Attack for it can still be seen as a preferential choice rather than a direct benefit.

The faster weapon switch has its uses as well besides a bullet jumping sacrifice. While this is not a combat Engineering situation, there is an argument for the Panic Attack on defensive Engineer. He will not be on his primary at all times, using his wrench to repair, upgrade, and build while using the Wrangler to do long range damage and tank. The Panic Attack’s faster weapon switch can be useful during sudden close defensive encounters. If the Engineer runs the Wrangler on Combat Engineer, the faster weapon switch can be useful to quickly dispatch any overextending enemy player that intends to get the jump on the Engineer while he is distracted while manually controlling his Mini-Sentry.

The fast weapon switch for Combat Engineer in other scenarios can be irrelevant as the Engineer should have his primary out at almost all times to begin with, not to mention that only the first shot will have tight bullet spread.

I want to briefly touch on the Rescue Ranger. I stated earlier that the Rescue Ranger can be a self defense weapon in a pinch should the Engineer be running Level 3 Sentries. However, if self defense is the goal, then the hitscan Shotgun is more reliable and consistent. It is not worth all that much investing time into Rescue Ranger aim.

An Engineer can get more out of the Rescue Ranger if his team is protecting him well. Higher level teams will kill a poorly placed Level 3 Sentry quickly and if a high level team’s Spy saps the Level 3, even a mild amount of coordination from the enemy team will kill it. That said, a defensive minded Engineer is likely not going to need the damage provided by the Shotgun and better off protecting his Sentry. While this is not exactly a Combat Engineering situation, one can use his/her good DM for self-defense purposes.

The Short Circuit is a very powerful secondary, so much so that it is banned from competitive TF2. On a short note, the reason for the ban is that it turns KOTH maps into which team’s Engineer can produce the most energy balls. Because Demoman is the main damage dealer, Engineer’s Short Circuit renders all the spam almost null. Essentially, in Highlander, Engineer performs outside the scope of what he is meant to do and instead acts like a better Pyro.

Other than that, it is a wonderful weapon to use in Casual, given a reasonable Metal supply. Payload offense is an excellent format to use due to the car providing infinite Metal. Even without the cart, the ability to eliminate a large amount of rocket, grenade, and sticky spam is an incredible thing, even with the considerable 65 Metal cost.

The best timing to fire the Short Circuit orbs is when pushing with the team and defusing explosive spam. When not near a metal source, the Engineer only has 3 shots before running out of Metal. Under this condition, he needs to use each orb wisely.

It is also possible to blast jump with the Short Circuit akin to a Soldier’s rocket jump if the energy orb hits an enemy while the Engineer is near. He can obtain a surprising amount of height from this. This has the potential to give the Combat Engineer vertical mobility. However, the 65 Metal cost per jump can be costly and inefficient, as the Engineer will not be using it to negate enemy projectiles. In addition, the Engineer needs to be right next to the opponent for the blast jump to work, which means it can only happen when the Engineer is already in danger.

Another potential issue with the Short Circuit is that the Dispenser needs to be placed more in favor of the Engineer rather than the team.

With good Metal management and timing, the Short Circuit can be an incredible utility weapon for the Engineer that can protect his team from incredible amounts of damage.

Recall when I stated that a Combat Engineer cannot go wrong with equipping the Wrangler. I will now explain the sheer power of this utility item. At its core, the Wrangler provides the Combat Engineer with a long range option that he normally does not have on his own. In fact, many classes don’t have access to long ranged combat and it really matters that the Engineer has this ability.

The first thing to cover is the raw firepower the Wrangler indirectly provides. A Wrangled Mini-Sentry deals ~96 DPS. As far as the Combat Engineer is concerned, the Wrangler provides the Engineer with something very powerful and missing from his natural state: long range sustained damage. Up to this point, I discussed how the Combat Engineer is most effective at midrange and can be lethal at short range. With the Wrangler, this frail support class has a long range option. 96 DPS is nothing to scoff at. It will melt light classes quickly and will do a hefty amount of damage to heavier classes. All of this is available when the Engineer is relatively far away from combat, only immediately in danger from an enemy Sniper, or a Spy that is already in close proximity to the Engineer.

Speaking of being far away, a Combat Engineer can poke, harass, provide crowd control, and deny area from effectively infinite range. He can lockdown anywhere in the direct line of sight of the Mini-Sentry. While there is some bullet spread over a long range, the enemy needs to account for the presence of long range damage and the chip damage adds up over time regardless. Bullet spread and damage falloff occurs when the target is outside the Sentry’s automated firing range. In addition, damage falloff depends on how close the Engineer is to his target. The closer he is, the less damage falloff he will experience. The enemy has to contend with the fact that no matter where they stand, they will get shot at by the Wrangled Mini.

The classes that are particularly affected by this are the Demoman and Heavy. Recall that these two classes tend to not engage with the Engineer often in combat. They are the main combo force while the Engineer operates as a support and occasionally as a flank class. This is when the Wrangled Mini-Sentry truly shines, as both classes have unfavorable answers to this. For these two, it is a lose-lose situation vs a Wrangled Mini. To not fight is to concede ground and to fight it is to partake in an unfavorable engagement.

The Demoman prefers mid range combat against the bulk of the enemy team and their combo. While long range combat is not as alarming to the Demoman as close range combat, it is still troublesome. He needs to either fire charged Stickies onto the Mini-Sentry or begin walking towards the Mini-Sentry to get in optimal range. This wastes his time and divides his attention. During this entire time, the Wrangled Mini-Sentry is peppering the Demoman, racking up a significant amount of damage if not harassing him heavily. By engaging with a Wrangled Mini-Sentry, the Demoman would be wasting health, time, and damage on a disposable target instead of the main attack force of the Engineer’s team.

The Heavy prefers his enemies get closer to him, as his Minigun not only deals more damage at a closer range, but the bullet spread is less impactful and so more bullets can hit. Long range Wrangler attacks are nightmares for a Heavy. The concept of unfavorable range for the Demoman also applies here. A Wrangled Mini-Sentry is a small 300 HP target and the Heavy simply cannot deal that much damage in a reasonable length of time due to both the Sentry’s Minigun resistance and bullet spread. If the Heavy chooses to walk up to the Mini, he is wasting time and cannot attack while moving up quickly. All the while, the Engineer is firing a hail of Mini-Sentry Bullets at the Heavy. The Heavy will have trouble pushing to an area that is locked down by a Wrangled Mini-Sentry, assuming that the Mini-Sentry is at a far away location.

As stated, the Wrangled Mini-Sentry is excellent for long range harassment. Because of the overall accuracy of a Wrangled Mini and the sheer DPS from that range, the Engineer can do more than chip damage to enemies from afar. If the Engineer conditioned his opponents that he is able to use the Wrangler well, then the mere sight of the Wrangler’s laser can be used as a means of area denial and suppressive fire. When using the Mini-Sentry for long range damage, it is best for the Engineer to place his Minis in significantly more open spaces to cover as much area as possible, as the Sentry will no longer be inhibited by its natural detection range.

The Wrangler is also used for tanking the Mini-Sentry, especially in situations where the enemy has a way to target the Mini-Sentry from outside its normal range. With the 300 HP of the shielded Mini-Sentry, the Engineer is able to consume more ammo from the enemy. This is particularly painful for the Demoman and Soldier. Each sticky, pipe, and rocket in the clip is sacred to any veteran of the class due to how much damage they could have dealt to their enemies and the slow reload. Forcing them to consume their precious explosives on such a disposable target is impactful. It not only redirects damage, but it also wastes their time. With the time spent reloading their weapon, they could have been engaged in more meaningful combat. Even if the enemy isn’t the Soldier or Demoman, any class with a weapon that needs to reload or high damage output is impacted by tanking the Mini-Sentry with the Wrangler’s shield. It takes 4 direct pipes, 4 direct normal rockets, 4 well placed stickies, or 5 shotgun shells with all pellets hitting to kill a full health Wrangled Mini-Sentry.

A Wrangled Mini-Sentry is also a good distraction and redirector. Due to the Mini-Sentry’s potential to deter enemy aggression, it is a more immediate threat and an obstacle to the primary objective. Thus, intelligent and experienced enemies tend to make it a priority target. This will peel attention and damage from classes like the Medic and Sniper. Let’s not forget how much punishment a Wrangled Mini-Sentry can take before going down.

Lastly, the Wrangler can be used for bullet jumping. The benefits of bullet jumping will be discussed in its own part but overall, using the Wrangler for bullet jumping gives the Engineer access to places he normally would be able to go by walking or by using a building to vault. It also gives him a sudden burst of mobility that normally wouldn’t be possible. With the Mini-Sentry, the Engineer can minimize the amount of self damage he takes during the jump, leaving him with more health should he land close or directly into combat.

A couple cautionary notes about the Wrangler. A Wrangled Mini-Sentry has a hard time pressuring enemies out of certain angles and corners because the Engineer needs to move the Mini-Sentry to get better positioning because its long range is from a fixed point. Be more conscious of the Mini-Sentry position if the Engineer is positioning it to Wrangle at enemies from afar. Speaking of long range capabilities, still try to be with a teammate when Wrangling a Mini-Sentry when the Engineer is closer to the fight. It is usually fine for the Engineer to be alone when Wrangling from a passive spot.

As many can see, the Wrangler is an unbelievably powerful secondary weapon in both the damage, utility, and niche mobility it can provide the combat Engineer. Much of TF2 is about exerting as much pressure as possible on the enemy team and the Wrangler provides a massive boon in that respect to the Engineer. It is critical to use the Wrangler properly on the Combat Engineer and not just with defensive Level 3 Sentries.

The Pistol is not a bad weapon at all. In fact, it is an amazing and underrated Engineer secondary. It is seldom used not because the weapon itself is bad, but because the power and utility of the Wrangler overshadows it. With a clip size of 12 and each bullet having a base damage of 15, it can do a staggering 180 damage assuming fixed based damage and all of the 12 bullets hit. That 15 damage ramps up to an impressive 22 if the Engineer is close enough to the target. Never underestimate the Pistol. It is extremely powerful if it is in the hands of a player with insane tracking:


One thing that the Engineer has over the Scout when it comes to the Pistol is that he has 200 bullets in reserve compared to the Scout’s 36, which leave some Scout mains wanting and running out of steam rather quickly when he uses the Pistol for even a moderate firefight. The Engineer can stream out this incredible damage almost without needing to worry about ammo count at all. Much like the Wrangler, the Engineer can use the Pistol for long range harassment and chip damage. The fast reload, the fast firing rate, and the reasonable damage makes it a suitable weapon for this. The 200 reserve ammo allows the Engineer to spam it with little to no consequence. He can also use the Pistol as a good backup/complementary weapon to primaries that can run out of ammo quickly such as the Frontier Justice or the Widowmaker.

One situation where the Combat Engineer would want to use the Pistol over the Wrangler is when the fight tends to be at close quarters. This geography inhibits the long range Mini-Sentry ability that the Wrangler provides. It would be better to run the Pistol in this case, as the sum of the Mini-Sentry’s normal firing rate, the primary, and the Pistol combined would deal more damage and be more flexible than the limited long range Wrangler pressure.

It can also be used on particularly Metal poor areas and maps. In these situations, the Engineer could equip the Pistol as the lack of Metal would mean he deploys less Mini-Sentries. Since the Engineer cannot rely on his Mini-Sentry all the time, using the Pistol allows him to be a more active combatant without it.

Speaking of Mini-Sentries, the Pistol can serve as a personal style choice. Some Combat Engineers like to place their Mini-Sentries in positions that don’t use many sightlines but instead lockdown specific yet important areas. The Wrangler will not be as useful with this kind of Mini-Sentry placement so the Pistol could play a more active role. The Mini-Sentry can lockdown one area while the Engineer himself can support another location.

As mentioned earlier, the Wrangler can be troublesome to use when the Mini-Sentry cannot reliably hit enemies at all angles and when enemies take cover near the Engineer such as Lakeside and most payload maps. On payload maps in particular, the linear design tends to offer the fewest chances for the Wrangler to make a difference. Mini-Sentries cannot cover the insane amount of area they could cover on the average KOTH map. Maps and situations like this are when the Pistol shines, as the Engineer can simply move to change his angle of attack to deal the ranged damage. Another reason to use the Pistol over the Wrangler is when the latter leaves the Engineer too exposed.

On a final note, due to the sheer power and utility of the Wrangler, it is still worth running instead of the Pistol even though the situation and map doesn’t perfectly suit the Wrangler. The Shotgun will be sufficient for countless situations and battles. The Combat Engineer needs to be able to balance between these factors in deciding between these two secondaries.

Before going over valid to somewhat valid melee weapons, it is worth discussing the differences between the Mini-Sentry and Leveled Guns when it comes to the combat Engineer.

The rule of thumb is that Mini-Sentries is the default Sentry for the Combat Engineer and he could switch to Leveled Guns when there is not much Combat Engineering to do because there is less opportunity or it is impossible to be mobile and deal direct damage.

Payload offense tends to sometimes lend itself to stock Sentry play because of its linear design, which means that enemies can realistically come from one main angle and there are many holding points and chokes. An example of this is attacking Upward last point. The main area of operation for the Engineer is around the corner leading to the “bowl” to the final point. The Engineer has limited options to move and fight. All passages are either too restrictive or on too low ground to favor Mini-Sentries and direct combat. During these cases, some Engineers opt to run Leveled Guns to siege the point instead while still attempting to take ground and participate in fights. Since he cannot take advantage of the mobility of the Mini-Sentry, it can be a better decision to run Leveled Guns which lack mobility, but have greater firepower and pressure the objective.



When the Combat Engineer uses Leveled Guns, he must understand that he is now more tied to the Sentry than usual and becomes more of a “hybrid”. While the Engineer is free to roam around and take fights where necessary and do work with his DM, he has invested a substantial amount of time and Metal into the building. Because Leveled Guns would be a greater damage source than the Engineer himself in many cases, it is likely better to tend to the Sentry rather than participating in direct combat.

KOTH maps, on the other hand, are much scrappier and don't lend themselves to stock Sentries. Simply put, there are too many angles and not enough time. The Engineer must be mobile and be able to fend for himself. There is the rare KOTH map that has geography that is suitable for Leveled Guns, but it still must be planned and executed carefully. In essence, using Leveled Guns is effectively tying the Combat Engineer down.

This is the iconic and quintessential Combat Engineer weapon as it grants the Engineer the ability to deploy the Mini-Sentry. While these Sentries have less overall DPS and HP and cannot be upgraded, they are cheaper, deploy faster, and are more disposable than the normal Sentry. Costing 100 Metal, the Engineer can deploy two of them on a full 200 supply of Metal.

Because the Mini-Sentry is cheap, disposable, and fast building, the Engineer becomes more mobile relative to him using Leveled Guns. This is what allows him to be the Combat Engineer, be more proactive and cover more ground in a way that the Wrenches cannot.

The 25 HP bonus is fantastic. The extra health in conjunction with the Mini-Sentry gives the Engineer that much more ability to be aggressive and take ground. It will save the Combat Engineer from dying in many situations and without the Health bonus, he would not be as strong as he is. In addition, the 225 HP overheal buff is excellent. That is a little more than a Soldier and it allows the Engineer to be more mobile and take fights with his newfound mobility he would normally avoid head on. Combat Engineer would be nowhere as strong as he is if the Gunslinger’s health bonus did not exist.

Landing the Gunslinger’s third punch for a critical hit is uncommon but can happen in a pinch. The Engineer’s fragile health pool and average speed leaves him rather ill equipped to last all 3 punches let alone running away. However, on high health opponents like the Heavy that can get tunnel visioned on their targets, the Engineer can attempt to go for the third punch as a last resort. It works more often than some would think. The third consecutive punch does not need to be on the same target either. The Engineer can punch a Sniper twice to kill him then immediately use the third crit punch on the Demoman, leading to a quick double kill. However, the DPS from this is still below what is offered by the Shotgun overall and it is still the superior option for most of the time.

If the Combat Engineer wishes to use a wrench, the Jag is a simple and reasonable alternative to the Gunslinger. With its faster swing speed and the increased construction boost, the Combat Engineer has the option to build and redeploy Level 1 Sentry Guns as a bulkier and heavier hitting Mini-Sentry that has the option of being upgraded.

There is a specific instance where the Jag can be used on a KOTH map. When there is about to be overtime for either team, the Engineer can prepare a Level 1, a Level 1 with 175 Metal, or even a Level 2 and bring it to the point as an all-in. This is because in the instance of overtime, the Engineer will likely have time for only one Sentry. Because of this small window of time, the Engineer can choose to use a higher quality Sentry to make the most out of it and the Jag will ensure that the Sentry of choice can be deployed as fast as possible. The issue is that if this Sentry is destroyed and focused down quickly, then the Engineer is left vulnerable with less health and no time for another Sentry.

This wrench for combat engineering is experimental. I want to preface this, as much of what I am about to discuss is on the theory crafting end and still requires development. This weapon is useful for the Combat Engineer in two ways: rapid response/macromovement and weapon cycling.

Let’s go over the first one of the two. Because of the Eureka Effect’s ability to teleport the Engineer directly to the Teleporter Exit, he can now be at multiple places at once. Recall that the Teleporter Exit can be farther away from the Combat Engineer, as the Exit will not be used to supplement a traditional nest. With this in mind, the Engineer is capable of traveling across the map. Macromovement. The Engineer can operate with his Sentry in a location relatively far from the Exit and when the Engineer himself is needed in an area close to the Exit, the Engineer can use the Eureka Effect to teleport and reinforce with his DM.

The other use is what I call weapon cycling. This is using the Eureka Effect to teleport to spawn, change primaries and secondaries, or even the melee, and then use the existing Teleporter to reenter the fight. If the Combat Engineer is running Shotgun and finds that his Sentry acquired some kills and assists, he can quickly swap to the Frontier Justice, and prepare for an income of guaranteed Crits in the near future.

This is the last major part of this paper and will be dedicated to the details of playing the Combat Engineer himself. This part will discuss combat and tactics when playing this style of play. I will try to talk as conceptually as I can, because as long as the player holds the proper ideas, he/she can apply them to many maps and situations.

What I want to emphasize before we begin is that Combat Engineering or Dimension 1 style of play is straightforward as an overall concept but not simple in its execution. It requires refined mechanical skills, patience, a sense of timing, and excellent game knowledge to maximize its effectiveness.

You can have impeccable DM, but if you don’t have a gameplan, those mechanics will not be used to their fullest potential.

Here are some tactical fundamental points:

1. Do not let the enemy have the objective or key territory for free.
   
2. Know that Engineer is supplementary and amplifying.
   
3. Consider how well one can work with certain teammates to make their jobs easier and/or more effective.

I will begin this by stating what the core essence of combat engineering is: filling gaps/holes in the team. With the increased mobility granted by the Gunslinger, the Engineer is capable of proactively roaming and providing aid to wherever his team needs him. If the flank needs help, the Combat Engineer rotates. If he anticipates an attack on his combo, he rotates to support and protect. He is constantly doing something directly on the field. Spychecking. Fighting. Rotating. Keeping up area denial under constant fire. The Combat Engineer ends up being a “jack of all trades”.

The Engineer is now more than his buildings. Since he can now be a force of his own and because of how fast Combat Engineering can be, there are moments where his buildings may not be the highest priority. Yes. The Engineer can still stick to his core design by protecting his buildings and securing important defensive positions, but he can now be more active in securing the objective.

The Combat Engineer should seek to position himself in the following ways:
1. He should seek to position himself around his team. The Combat Engineer cannot do much on his own due to his fragility. Always remember that the Engineer, no matter what style and dimension of play, is an amplifier.
2. Always note sightlines. An excellent Sniper is a constant threat. Recall the Sniper section where I said that the Engineer is a particularly easy class to headshot.
3. The Engineer should play passively when alone. In most cases, it is better to be aggressive with teammates.
3a. Do not be disconnected from the team.
4. Keep note of where the main force on both sides are when taking ground.
5. The Combat Engineer ought to position himself in a way that he is readily able to contest the objective and/or support his teammates.
5a. If the ground is important, he should hold it as long as possible, even alone. That said, he must be sure to retreat and regroup with his team once the enemy decides to make any push short of substantial.

The Combat Engineer can support his team sufficiently by staying and holding one good location, but there are times where the Combat Engineer should maneuver and rotate to optimize his value. In respect to this document, maneuvering is defined as larger scale repositioning. This is contrasted with the colloquial term ‘movement’ which generally refers to micromovement in direct combat to minimize damage and maximize positional advantage.

Here are basic points about maneuvering:
1. Pay close attention to the maneuvering of allies, both those you plan to stick to and those who you do not.
2. If possible, communicate your location and intent to your team.
3. Always anticipate enemy action and engagement based on available information (e.g. Spy decloaking, Soldier bombing, Scout runbys, etc.) and proactively prepare and position yourself.

I would like to go in more detail about the first point. You should always know where your allies are when taking ground. Assuming that the Engineer is on the flank and not with the main combo force, the two entities should be in sync and you should make efforts to know about their whereabouts and upcoming actions. This is to make sure that any sort of attack that the Combo initiates is two pronged. Once they push, the Combat Engineer can push in. One strength about the Combat Engineer is that he excels under chaotic situations because the distracted enemies allow him to close the gap and flank with impunity. The Combo creates a lot of pressure and will draw plenty of attention and firepower from the enemy. In fact, allies, especially bulkier classes, are excellent distractions for the Combat Engineer to take advantage of. This creates an excellent opening for the Combat Engineer to go for flanks and picks. These opportunities open up more often when the Combat Engineer is aware of the Combo’s position and upcoming pushes.

The Mini-Sentry is arguably what makes the Combat Engineer what he is. This disposable, cheap, and fast building Sentry allows the Engineer to be mobile and proactive while still adhering to the Engineer's core design.

Note that while the Mini-Sentry is usually deemed as a powerful tool and a great nuisance, it generally won’t acquire many kills against better players. They will kill it quickly, react appropriately, and won’t overextend. As a result, the Mini-Sentry is better used to temporarily distract the enemy team. These are crucial seconds where the team can get a key pick and acquire better positioning.

The following sections will cover the various uses of the Mini-Sentry, involved tactics, and how to use it effectively in combat.

The Mini-Sentry has two major functions: area-denial and redirection. I will go over both of them in detail.

Area denial is the main job of the traditional Sentry and the Mini-Sentry is no different. Objectives, such as Control Points or the Payload Cart, tend to be key areas for the Engineer to cover with a Mini-Sentry. If the Engineer cannot build the Mini-Sentry to guard the objective, he should place the Mini-Sentry in a passive position that can still occupy some important flanking routes and allows him to quickly pick up and redeploy the Mini-Sentry where it will guard the objective. This tends to happen when the Engineer’s team is losing the fight or at least falling back.

There are two rather extreme cases to Mini-Sentry positioning: aggressive hold and backline protection. There are times when the Engineer plays with an aggressive team or at the very least has significant advantage. In these cases, the Mini-Sentry should be placed aggressively as well, even farther than the objective and into what is normally enemy territory. This is to maximize the amount of ground the enemy needs to retake before being able to regroup and attempt their push proper. In cases where the team is being pushed back, however, the Engineer will have less space to work with and must adjust the strategy to compensate. In this case, the Engineer needs to stay back and protect his playmakers, particularly the Sniper and the Demoman. A couple headshots or a few seconds of sticky spam can be crucial for the team to ward off enough enemies to stabilize.



The other major job of the Mini-Sentry is a redirector. I mentioned briefly that better players tend to focus down Mini-Sentries and also just discussed how the Mini-Sentry should be placed where it is a constant roadblock to the enemy. Because of this, the Mini-Sentry tends to be under fire and this can be used to the Combat Engineer’s advantage.

It bears repeating, but Mini-Sentries are cheap and build quickly. The Combat Engineer can place 2 with a full Metal bank and he can simply plant one down whenever he loses one. In addition, a Wrangled Mini-Sentry is very durable, being able to withstand 300 damage. Furthermore, a Wrangled Mini-Sentry does an impressive 96 DPS. Wrangling the Mini-Sentry, as described previously, makes the Mini-Sentry a higher priority target and the Engineer is able to do this essentially on demand. The redirection and distraction gives good teams the opportunity to capitalize.

Optimally, the Mini-Sentry should be positioned preemptively with the following considerations:
1. Key areas such as objective and popular routes.
2. In anticipation of enemy movements such as Scout runbys and Soldier bombs.
3. If allies are communicating, placing Mini-Sentries according to allied information (e.g. X class is heading in Y direction).

Sometimes the Engineer does not have time nor the circumstance to proactively place Mini-Sentries like this. During such a situation, building a Mini-Sentry can be a waste of metal, as the enemy will destroy it quickly. Under this condition, it is best for the Engineer to pre-build the Mini-Sentry behind cover or in a passive spot before hauling the Mini-Sentry and repositioning it where he desires.

If one is unsure of where to place the Mini-Sentry during a round, a consistently helpful location is overlooking the Objective. This will deny the enemy team easy access to important areas and give the team a stronger hold once the Engineer has secured them.

This luxury is not always available, however. When there is a major firefight, there usually isn’t enough time to carefully place one down. But this is fine, as one does not have to be too conscious with its placement. When the time allows, certainly take the effort of optimal positioning. There are key Mini-Sentry spots if one consults an experienced Engineer. All this said, throwing them down in any sort of reasonable location will suffice. When it comes to Mini-Sentries, there are not many ‘wrong’ spots.

The Engineer’s exact position relative to his Mini-Sentry generally does not matter. The Combat Engineer is either roaming around while the Mini-Sentry occupies a certain location or holding vital ground with the building. I must emphasize that much of the Combat Engineer’s utility in a fight comes from the Mini-Sentry and even more with the Wrangler. An Engineer alone is easy pickings but this is noticeably more difficult with a Mini-Sentry nearby.

Speaking of the Wrangler, the Mini-Sentry should be placed in front of the Engineer when using it so that the shielded Gun can take damage for the Engineer. The Engineer ought to play closer to the Mini-Sentry, especially if either or both teams are scrappy and there is constant fighting that requires the shield to be readily available. The Engineer should also use whatever cover is available when actively Wrangling the Mini-Sentry. This can be props on the map or even the geography itself.

The Combat Engineer should open fire with his weapons on enemies that the Mini-Sentry is currently shooting if the two entities are close to each other. This is because the Mini-Sentry prioritizes the closest target which also means that enemy in particular will be the best Shotgun target. In addition, it is usually better to focus fire than to split damage. It is better to dump 300 damage into a Heavy for a more guaranteed kill rather than splitting 150 to the Heavy and 150 to the Soldier, resulting in both targets living and potentially surviving the duration of the fight.

On a more minor note, I’d like to talk about repairing the Mini-Sentry. Since Mini-Sentries are disposable and cheap, it is better to build a new one. Because Mini-Sentries are consistently under fire, the Combat Engineer frequently will not have the opportunity to repair his Gun at all, and will have to build a new one out of necessity. However, it is appropriate to repair the building if it is being damaged from spam and poked from afar. Repairing will be faster than rebuilding. It is also worth repairing the Mini-Sentry when there is not enough immediate Metal available to build a new one. Since there is not enough Metal to rebuild a new one quickly, it is better to spend the remaining Metal on maintaining the Mini-Sentry. Do not bother repairing the Mini-Sentry in a fight or exchange. It is better to Shotgun or Wrangle under the pressures of battle.

While this isn’t the most efficient use of a Mini-Sentry, the Engineer can place one down as he is retreating in order to delay the enemy push. This might be able to buy precious seconds for the Engineer to either retaliate or rendezvous with teammates.

The Dispenser is geared towards allies rather than the Engineer. Since the Combat Engineer is likely no longer running Leveled Guns, he is much more metal independent. The Combat Engineer can simply pick up ammo boxes from both the map itself and dead players, allowing him to play away from his Dispenser more often. Thus, the Dispenser needs to be placed in a way that greatly suits combat and ammo crunching classes. This tends to place the Dispenser next to the combo classes, as the Heavy, Demoman, and Pyro all consume ammo at very high rates.

The normal guidelines for Dispenser placement still apply:

• Behind the frontlines.
  
• Behind cover.
  
• Be mindful of enemy spam, as the Dispenser gathers allies and leaves them cornered and vulnerable to splash damage.

Having a Dispenser is extremely important, even if it is Level 1 for the entire game. Heavy, Pyro, Demo, and Soldier all consume ammunition very quickly on a regular basis, especially the first 3. If one hasn’t played these classes, one should at least dabble in them to understand how painful this lack of ammo can be. A team can sustain itself in a war of attrition with even a Level 1 Dispenser. Heavies will be continuously firing at enemies and Spychecking. Pyros will be Spychecking and repeatedly airblasting projectiles and players getting too close. Demoman and Soldier will both be spamming explosives at the enemy team. All these classes will greatly benefit from a Dispenser of any level. Due to this, the Dispenser is usually placed next to the combo classes. It is worth noting that the Soldier may visit the Dispenser before leaving to his position or going for a bomb. This could have some impact on his travel path or change how long it takes for him to get to his destination.

As a quick aside, there are cases where the Combat Engineer does build a Dispenser more for himself or for flanking classes like the Scout and Soldier. This can happen when the Combat Engineer is unable to build a Dispenser for the combo because he is either unable to reach them safely or because the non-combo flank ground is more important to hold at the moment. As stated earlier, the Soldier chews through ammo quickly due to spam. The flat health regeneration is useful to the Scout due to his low health pool. The additional sustaining power a Dispenser can provide in general allows the flank to take more fights and increase their uptime. When the team pushes to retake ground or the flank is secured, then the Engineer can proceed to move the Dispenser up more aggressively or to the Combo.

Because a Level 1 Dispenser is sufficient to fulfill the ammo needs of the team, upgrading it is one of the lowest priority things for the Engineer to do. A Dispenser is more in the front line and is likely to die in a concerted enemy push. If there is a good amount of downtime and the Combat Engineer is unable to properly enter a fight, then he ought to upgrade the Dispenser. The healing, especially at Level 3, can be very useful to the team. 20 HP/s is comparable Medic’s normal healing rate of 24 HP/s. The healing boost can take pressure off of the Medic and greatly increase the uptime of allies around it. The Combat Engineer ought to upgrade the Dispenser when there is absolutely nothing else to do. Remember that even a Level 1 Dispenser will do and is more than sufficient for the team if there is a Medic. All this said, it is better to upgrade than not to if there is the time and resources to do so as the health stream can be an excellent resource.

The ammo aspect of the Dispenser has a more immediate and consistent use. Dispensers die very quickly so it is best to not be too invested into it. Because of this, the Combat Engineer should mostly be concerned that a Dispenser is active on the field at all times. He should just put down a new Dispenser and begin roaming rather than invest precious time in trying to level it up. When an Engineer’s Dispenser goes down, he should not be focused on immediately getting it back online. The Dispenser builds slowly and begins at 0 HP meaning that building one with incorrect timing could just be a waste of precious metal reserves. By holding of fon buil;ding a new Dispenser until it is safe to do so, the Engineer has more time to be an active combatant and has less of a chance of wasting Metal.

Any relatively experienced TF2 player knows the impact of a well placed and maintained Teleporter. The constant reinforcements to the frontlines can make or break a match. Due to this, the Teleporter should certainly be upgraded to Level 3 when the time allows. Because players spawn in waves, having a Level 3 Teleporter will get that respawn group to the front lines quickly instead of staggering. Saving time is extremely important and the massive time save from even a Level 2 Teleporter can be a game changer. The Combat Engineer is still a support class that must play with his teammates to be effective and having a Teleporter of any level gives a constant flow of allies for the Engineer to support.

Much like the Dispenser, the Teleporter is not necessary for directing allies to support a traditional nest and support the Engineer directly. Because of this, the Engineer ought to place the Teleporter in an area that is much more favorable for slower and powerful classes like the Heavy, Demoman, and Medic. These classes tend to operate away from the Combat Engineer and thus the Teleporter will sometimes be located away from the Combat Engineer’s area of operations.

It is highly recommended to use the Eureka Effect to get cheaper Teleporters. If the Engineer places a Teleporter with the Eureka Effect and switches to the Gunslinger, the Teleporters will still have the 100 Metal upgrade requirement. This halves the time and Metal required to get the Teleporter to a Level 3. Again, it is very much worth doing this. Do not be lazy and go for this as much as possible.


A smoother way to get cheaper Eureka Effect on rollout is to do the following:
1. Have two identical weapon loadouts, but one has the Eureka Effect and one has the Gunslinger. Cosmetics don’t matter.
2. Spawn with the Eureka Effect loadout and prepare the Teleporter Entrance (Engineer holding the toolbox in his hand).
3. Hit the loadout bind that has the Gunslinger loadout.
4. If the sequence is performed properly, the Engineer should still have the toolbox in his hands but has the Gunslinger loadout.
5. Deploy the Teleporter Entrance. It will have the 100 Metal upgrade requirement while having the Gunslinger equipped.

With this, the Engineer will be able to deploy a cheaper Teleporter while having the Gunslinger equipped right at the beginning of the match without needing to place the Teleporter Entrance, reenter spawn, and switch loadouts.

With this, the Engineer will be able to deploy a cheaper Teleporter while having the Gunslinger equipped right at the beginning of the match without needing to place the Teleporter Entrance, reenter spawn, and switch loadouts.

This technique is very useful against good Spies. They will be on the Teleporter to sap it so often that the time saved from cheaper Teleporters is crucial to maintain Teleporter uptime. The Combat Engineer should keep rebuilding the Teleporter no matter how often the Spy destroys it. He should not give up. A Level 3 Teleporter is critical to winning.

As a final but short note, do not run from the frontlines back to spawn to build the Teleporter Entrance. There are more immediate threats to take care of. The following video is a quick example. The BLU Engineer left the front lines to rebuild his Teleporter Entrance. During his absence, the RED Soldier bombed over the roof, forcing the Medic’s Uber. If the Combat Engineer remained on the roof with his Mini-Sentry, the RED Soldier would have been easily denied and the BLU Medic’s Uber would have been preserved.

This section will talk about what the Combat Engineer should do during Ubercharges. This paper will not dedicate a section to the Quick Fix and the Vaccinator, but because of the intense healing or sustainability they provide, we will treat them as an Uber in respect to the Combat Engineer.

In general, the Engineer should not directly participate in an Uber Exchange. He does not have the durability, raw damage, and strong movement impairing abilities to contribute to the fight.

We will go over 3 different scenarios:
1. Both teams Uber at approximately the same time.
2. Enemy Ubers, but the ally Medic does not have/use.
3. Ally Medic uses, but the enemy Medic does not have/use

For the first case, if both teams Uber at the same time, the Combat Engineer should keep a distance. At the most, he should kite the Uber or hover around to shoot at any un-Ubered players. As stated, the Engineer has no direct part in an Uber. Even fighting un-Ubered players in an exchange can come with some risk, as good Medic will overheal allies before using. It is best for the Engineer to preserve his life.

In the second case, the Combat Engineer simply needs to retreat. Without an allied Uber to buffer or to work off of, the Combat Engineer cannot make any lasting impact in such an unfavorable position. Again, he should preserve his life, retreat, and secure more passive ground with his team.

If the Combat Engineer’s team uses Uber but the enemy does not have or does not use theirs, the Engineer should still maintain distance but this time more aggressively. For the Combat Engineer, the post Uber is when the ‘actual’ fight happens. The optimal/preferred use of an Uber is to get key teammates into favorable positions. This can also include the Mini-Sentry. In a post Uber, the Combat Engineer is very effective. Almost every post Uber, everyone will be scattered and out of position. Someone is likely caught out. The Engineer is good at exploiting them through Wrangler spam, managing to sneak up for a meatshot, positioning himself in a strong flanking area, etc. The two classes that tend to be caught out are the Heavy and Pyro. The former due to his sluggish speed and the former because the Pyro is on the front to stuff the Uber. The Engineer should use the Uber to setup, get in a better position, and move forward. Optimally, the enemy team should push into him and his allies, and work with his team to gain momentum.

On a parting note, there are 4 classes that Medics tend to Uber: Scout, Demoman, Heavy, and Pyro.

The Medic Ubers the Scout to acquire kills. His speed allows him to get in the enemy’s face without using too much of the Uber and his burst damage will allow him to quickly pick off enemies that cannot take advantage of his fragility.

The Medic Ubers the Demoman to clear out an area. Thanks to his massive splash damage, the Demoman can force enemies out of a key area at the least and explode a team into Kingdom Come at the most.

The Medic Ubers the Heavy because either the Demoman died/is absent or because the team is already in a good position and in front of the enemy team. The Heavy does excellent damage at close range and when the enemy team is in front of him. In addition, if the enemy team is caught out of position, an Ubered Heavy can force the opponent to target more mobile classes while the Heavy can comfortably sit in place and deal the damage he needs.

The Medic Ubers the Pyro usually to stuff the enemy Uber thanks to the airblast. This tends to happen when the Medic Pyro combo is on Payload defense.

Kritzkrieg comes second place in medigun usage frequency. In addition, this medigun’s charge is diametrically different from Stock.

There is a super secret strategy when it comes to countering the Kritzkrieg. In fact, even top Invite players have trouble grasping this. The strategy is this: walk at the enemy players and kill them. I’m serious. The best way to counter the Kritz is to simply collapse on the enemy team. Usually people run away when the Kritzkrieg activates. This leads to predictable movement and leaves them very vulnerable to the critical hits. A good number of people treat an incoming Kritz like an Uber and flee. Because players under the effects of a Krtiz are not invulnerable, collapsing on them is the counterintuitive counter.

When both teams use the Kritz or only the enemy team Kritz, the Combat Engineer can be very powerful and useful. He can take a sacrificial role, taking Crits that could have landed on the Medic all the while pumping shotgun shells into the patient. This buys crucial seconds and deals damage to the Kritz patient so allies can follow up. A Wrangled Mini-Sentry is also extremely effective. Buildings are not affected by critical hits not to mention the Wrangler shield. However, the Engineer should not go out of his way to bodyblock a Kritz every time. If the Engineer cannot get close to the target in short order, then he ought to use Wrangled Mini-Sentries or fire upon other nearby players, as they will be aggressing with the Kritz.

Whether the Engineer is with the main Combo or the Flank, he should take the opportunity to bodyblock the Kritz if he is in its path. This window is wider when the Engineer is on the Flank, as the Krtized enemy will likely be too focused on his team’s Medic or Heavy rather than someone in the peripheral. If the Engineer is out of range, then it is best to use the Wrangler to pepper the incoming enemy Combo.

What makes these two cases particularly favorable for the Combat Engineer is that the enemy team needs to overextend and play very aggressively to make the best use of the Kritz. This can feed enemies into the Mini-Sentry, Wrangler, and the Shotgun. Any experienced Engineer main dreams of having a parade of non-Ubered enemies walking with reckless abandon right into his Sentry’s range.

Let us now go over the responses to certain scenarios to the Kritz.

If the Engineer’s team uses Kritz and the enemy does not have Uber, one of two things will happen:
1. The enemies will run.
2. The enemies will collapse on the Engineer’s team.

There is not too much for the Combat Engineer to do in the first case. He does not have the mobility to join the push and because fleeing targets tend to move predictably, the Kritzed teammate will kill or heavily damage most of them.

The second case is when the Combat Engineer can shine. If the enemy team is smart and decides to collapse on the Kritz, they put themselves out of position and have to play very aggressively to do so. This leads to the same favorable position as I discussed earlier: enemies marching right into the Engineer’s Sentry and Shotgun. A Combat Engineer can punish the overextension and provide protection for the Kritzed teammate.

There are 3 major targets that the Medic uses the Kritzkrieg on: Demoman, Heavy, and Soldier.

Demoman is the obvious one. Any player with even a small amount of experience can recount horror stories about a Kritz Demoman lobbing 300 damage Stickies to wipe his team. Despite the sheer power and killing potential of a Kritz Demoman, he is the easiest Kritz patient for the Engineer to deal with. Refer to the section about fighting the Demoman to see why in detail. In short, bodyblocking him following up with Shotgun blasts or a Wrangled Mini-Sentry will be effective in dealing with him.

Heavy is another very common Kritz recipient. The ‘laser beams’ are actually quite deadly and the Kritz removes the Heavy’s weakness of damage falloff. A Heavy with even somewhat decent tracking can prove very troublesome. The best way to handle this is a Wrangled Mini-Sentry. As stated in the Heavy section, an experienced Heavy can simply flick to a nearby Engineer, shred him, then continue with what he was doing. Obviously the Kritz makes this a lot easier. It is best to stay at a distance, use the Wrangled Mini-Sentry as cover, and pepper him from afar. Most teammates will likely be taking cover and/or running away so the Engineer needs to take care if the Heavy decides to turn his attention to the harrassing Engineer.

A Soldier Kritz is somewhat rare, as the Pyro can easily reflect his rockets back at him, but 270 damage rockets from virtually any distance is nothing to scoff at. The Combat Engineer ought to sacrifice himself while fighting him to waste one of his 4 crockets or focus on other players that are overaggressing to complement their Kritz.

This section will talk about the value of the Combat Engineer’s life. Knowing this is very important as the Combat Engineer can go for riskier and extremely aggressive plays when his life is not as valued. On the other hand, the Combat Engineer can wisely stay back and be effective and useful when he realizes that his life is valuable and needed in the near future. The bottom line is that the Engineer should make every life and death meaningful in some way. Even though the Engineer is relatively weak in combat prowess, do not throw his life and take too many risks. There are objectives to cover. Teammates to protect. Buildings to construct. Ground to take with the team.

As discussed in a previous section, The Combat Engineer’s life is valuable after an Uber exchange and during a midfight. Anytime there is a major teamfight on or near the objective, the Combat Engineer should seek to stay alive. A reminder that the Combat Engineer and the Spy share the strength where they thrive during chaos both in game itself and in voice communications. There are more immediate and dangerous threats than the Engineer. Distracted players tend to not shoot Wrangled Mini-Sentries. If the enemy wants to push and secure the objective, then the Engineer should stay alive and prepare to deny the area.

While a rather niche case, the Engineer’s life value also increases when he has Frontier Justice Crits. Recall the discussion about the Frontier Justice. He should preserve his sudden burst of power when he can.

The Combat Engineer’s value decreases when area is denied and important enemies like the Medic, Demoman, and Sniper are killed. Under this condition and if the Engineer’s death does not impact his team’s hold too much, the Combat Engineer can go for a risky and very aggressive play. Despite the brevity of this statement, this situation can be seldom. The Combat Engineer has plenty of jobs to do and it is mostly better for him to stay at his post rather than go out on his own.

Do not confuse staying alive with playing too passive. Staying alive can easily be staying just out of midrange and chipping opponents, seconds away from danger. With the Sniper in particular, it is playing with an idea of where the Sniper and his sightlines are. By staying in the “safe zone”, the Engineer can stay alive while still contributing in small chunks.

I must emphasize that knowing when one should play aggressively and when to be reserved is a hard balance to achieve, even for high level competitive players. There are nuances to this game to consider and all of this will come with experience and fighting better and better players.

Because of the Combat Engineer’s relatively low value and low impact, he can easily go for a sacrifice or breaching play. In this case, the Engineer would be the first class to attack in a larger push. He is not a Level 3 Sentry Gun and not many teams will be initiating a push because of the death of the Combat Engineer. This can be a strength, in some way. The Combat Engineer can be used as a living missile or like the move Self-Destruct in Pokemon. Trading the Engineer for a high priority class is almost always worth it. His lower value can be used to his advantage. Keep in mind that sacrificing should be done somewhat sparingly. Better players won’t let the Engineer deal too much damage in a sacrifice attempt.

The Engineer should go for a sacrifice when the following conditions are met:

• All his buildings are up. Upgrades are optional.
  
• Any immediate threats are gone (Soldier bombs, Spies, etc).
  
• The victim is rather easily accessible.

Remember. A sacrifice should be a full commitment. Do not hesitate. The Engineer does not have the mobility/escape options to back out halfway. If the Combat Engineer commits, it should be when he will at least deal a considerable amount of damage to the enemy.

One of the major choices a Combat Engineer needs to make is whether he should be with the combo or the flank. For the most part, the Combat Engineer ought to remain on the flank. An open flank means that mobile enemy classes like the Scout and Soldier can roam freely. They can go for bombs, maneuver to get cheeky angles, and secure important portions of the map for free. Without a strong flank, the main Combo needs to spread itself thin to cover the missing holes. Because of this, such ground is important to control because it gives the Combat Engineer’s team more room to play aggressively. This means that the Combat Engineer can devote more time to his buildings and protecting others. By helping the team play more forward, the Combat Engineer can reach his full potential.

The Combat Engineer should be with the combo if there is an eminent bomb, Spy backstab attempt, or a sacrifice play coming for the Medic. Another case could be when the combo doesn’t have a Heavy to protect the Medic and Demo from anyone trying to get the jump on the duo. Never be with the combo when they are trying to push the object or take ground. The Engineer does not have the immediate damage nor the durability to participate and cannot participate in the spam wars. All in all, if the combo is covered, the Engineer should quickly make his way to the flank.

While I did say that the flank is where the Combat Engineer should gravitate to, this can easily change depending on the map’s geography. The Combat Engineer can end up tied to the flank or the combo depending what the favorable or ‘meta’ hold is. If the map explicitly has a flank hold such as the bathhouse on Lakeside, then the Engineer will likely hard hold it. On a map like Ashville, where the Combat Engineer spends much time on the roof, he is more geared towards the combo, as the ramp behind the roof is where they tend to hold. In maps like Product, there are cases where the Combat Engineer can move back and forth. In more organized environments like Highlander, it is worth discussing with the team where the Engineer should be. In a Casual match, the Engineer can select a location based on experience, intuition, and observation.

Flank ground is very important to secure. An open flank means that the enemy Soldier can roam free, getting good bombing and sniping angles. Scouts can go for flanks and attack from the back. Spies can freely observe positions and mount a stab. Even aggressive enemy Snipers can go for crazy sniping angles by moving into the flanks. Overall, giving away large swaths of the map is not a good idea, unless there is a good macro strategic reason to do so. Staying with the combo for too long can take resources from them such as heals and ammo. As long as a Dispenser is up, having an Engineer around the Combo without a specific reason is probably going to lead more to him being in the way than actually helping. It is better to hold the flank and use whatever resources the Combat Engineer can find there.

Holding the flank gives the Combat Engineer’s team a lot of breathing room, allowing more aggressive plays. This means that the Combat Engineer can devote more time to maintaining his buildings, protecting allies, and taking ground. Holding the flank gives the entire team more room and that extra space is what brings out the full potential of the Combat Engineer. Ironically, focusing on DM and mechanics is what allows the Engineer to focus more on buildings and other aspects that make the class so special.

The Combat Engineer is usually not the one to initiate an engagement and it is ill advised to engage the enemy alone. However, there are moments when doing this is appropriate.

If the Combat Engineer sees an important available trade, then he should certainly go for it. This should be during a time when the Combat Engineer’s life is not as valuable and when it is likely that the Combat Engineer can reach the target to deal significant amounts of damage.

Ally communication and actions can also be a green light to engage the enemy. The Combat Engineer should aggress when his team is pushing in a particular area and/or calls a priority target. This gives the Engineer an opportunity to attack the opponent from the flank or the back, which is when the Engineer has a few moments to wail on the target unimpeded.

Facing an aggressive team can also be a situation for engagement. If there is an aggressive team that has recently collided with the main forces of the Combat Engineer’s team, it is likely that many of the enemies are not only injured, but also close to or are overextending. This is prime time for the Combat Engineer to move in and aggressively pick off the forward, injured, and disoriented enemies.

Ultimately, a key element of playing aggressively and seeking to deal as much damage as possible is patience. Timing is key to make sure that the battle is in his favor. While this advice is pertinent to every class, it stands out for the Combat Engineer as he does not have the mobility and durability to sustain a fight for long so it is important that he engages when the conditions are most optimal.

Chip damage refers to damage not directly meant to kill the opponent but instead to harass them. In TF2 in particular, this is usually done by weapons that deal noticeably miniscule amounts of damage at a long range. The Engineer has several tools to deal chip damage including the Shotgun, Pistol, and most notably, a Wrangled Mini-Sentry. These small increments of 3-10 damage may not seem like much, but they do have some importance. A Combat Engineer should deal chip damage when he is able to.

Firstly, it resets the Crit Heals timer. The Medigun has a hidden mechanic where if the heal target has not taken damage in 10 seconds, the heal rate will increase from 24 HP/s to a staggering 72 HP/s over the course of 5 seconds. This mechanic exists to encourage players to retreat. If a retreating player takes even 1 point of damage, this counter resets. Experienced Medics know how to manage Crit Heals very well, using the boosted heal rate to top off injured players before returning to their pocket. Non-Medic players will take note of how they haven’t taken damage and communicate to their Medic to devote a couple seconds of Crit Heals to get them to full. Chip damage will reduce the maximum healing potential of the enemy Medic.

From a strategic standpoint, chip damage itself does not kill nor is a threat. What it does is accentuate the damage dealers on the Combat Engineer’s team. Peppering a Scout with Shotgun shells for Pistol bullets may not do much on its own, but that damage can make a single Sticky or Rocket lethal. Anyone even mildly experienced with TF2 has gone through many fights where he or she needed just a little more damage to kill the target. A good amount of chip damage before, during, and/or after the fight could have secured that kill. Because of this, retreating enemies after a team fight are excellent targets for chip damage. Offensive oriented classes will already be pursuing them and chip damage will assist them in securing extra kills.

There are also times the Combat Engineer’s team doesn’t want to directly engage against a large threat. Chip damage can help a team gear up for a fight and be the most safe and reliable source of damage for the Combat Engineer at certain stages of the game. An example of this is a team building Uber to retake the Point in KOTH. Unless the Combat Engineer is very confident in a trade, he will be wasting his life by charging into the enemy team. He could do more work during an Uber push. While his team is getting ready to attack, the Engineer can soften enemies with chip damage.

The Engineer is putting himself at risk by going for chip damage at certain times, because he could spend the time doing better things. A time where chip damage may not be appropriate is during a major firefight. In those instances, the Combat Engineer should be Wrangling the Mini-Sentry to deal sustained damage or going for mid to close range Shotgun shots. It is also worth mentioning that Sniper and Spies can go for major picks during a fight and Soldiers could bomb or rocket jump to the flank while others are distracted and focusing on doing chip damage will not help here.

The best weapon for dealing chip damage is the Pistol. This keeps the Shotgun clip full, the Pistol has fast reload, and has a great quantity of ammunition. Unlike the Wrangler, the Pistol does not require the Engineer to spend time and Metal building a Mini-Sentry, not to mention moving the Mini-Sentry if it is not in a favorable sightline. However, by running the Pistol, one actively deprives themselves of the Wrangler, making it a situational choice. If the Engineer has the Wrangler, Shotgun primaries are adequate chip damage weapons. Their spread also means that the Combat Engineer can deal chip damage to multiple enemies that are closer to each other. The Shotgun does the best chip damage from a little beyond mid range. A Wrangled Mini-Sentry does a great amount of damage from afar and is a great source of chip damage, even with the bullet spread.

Take great note of when the chip damage happens. Chip damage can be borderline worthless if the Engineer is peeking a Sniper sightline. Chip damage can be a great thing, but it should not come at the cost of the Engineer’s life if it isn’t to pick off an injured important enemy player.

The Combat Engineer’s role on payload is conceptually simple: push the Cart and build Teleporters. As stated, the Combat Engineer is far too fragile compared to power classes to bust a solid enemy defensive hold. Optimally, the Combat Engineer should stick to the Cart while the Combo takes the ground ahead of him. Additionally, he should place Teleporters and maximize their uptime while not neglecting the objective to keep the pressure up.

I would like to cover some details when it comes to pushing the Cart. The Combat Engineer should get away from the Cart under the following conditions:
1. Kill weakened enemies: Without enemies to resist, the Combat Engineer can push the Cart safely.
2. When there is a lot of spam on the Cart and the Combat Engineer’s life is in danger: This is to make sure that he can get right back onto the cart. If the Combat Engineer is dead, then the enemy team no longer needs to worry about the Engineer working on the Cart for a small period of time. With him retreating to safety, the enemy team must keep him in mind. There is mental pressure in simply being alive, as attention itself is a source.

Learn to crouch and move around the Cart for cover. This is extremely important as it not only minimizes damage from spam but almost ensures that the Engineer can hide from the Sniper.

The Combat Engineer normally should not die for the Cart unless it is close to the cap and/or there is little time on the clock.

One Cart pushing habit to entertain is building a Mini-Sentry ahead of the Cart and returning to push it. The reason for this is that the most frequent path for the enemy to take when contesting the Cart is directly engage from the front. If the Engineer is pushing the Cart alone, he can use the Mini-Sentry as a distraction to retreat. The Mini-Sentry in the forward position can help zone and clear out enemies ahead, allowing the Engineer to push the Cart that much farther. This isn’t always advised, however. Building the Mini-Sentry ahead means that there are precious seconds when the Cart is neglected. If the Combat Engineer is pushing the Cart alone and/or there is not much time on the clock, it would be better to build Mini-Sentries next to the Cart and replace them when the Cart travels too far ahead of the Mini-Sentry.

Usually Mini-Sentries are used on Defense because the Engineer is attempting to defend the last point on a Payload or A/D map but doesn’t have enough time to build a Leveled Gun. This is a perfectly fine thing to do. However, the Mini-Sentry and Combat Engineering is a viable tool for defense. I know this assumption is in play, but I must emphasize: these things require excellent DM to work. Mini-Sentry defense requires strong aim and mechanics to make up for the sheer zoning power and raw DPS of a Level 3.There are a few map geography points that makes Mini-Sentry defense viable or even preferable to a stock Sentry:
1. There are too many sightlines to any viable/meta Sentry spot.
2. There is too much open space or too much ground for a Leveled Sentry to comfortably cover. The enemy has more freedom and range of movement.
3. Somewhat connected to point 2, the map makes it so that being mobile and directly supportive of the flank leads to a strong defense.
4. There is a lot of high ground available to the enemy to attack the Sentry.
5. On non-last points, the Engineer finds his Level 3 being destroyed too easily or difficult to deploy.



Swiftwater 3rd exemplifies Point 1 and Point 4. The Sentry is usually placed on the metal platform indicated by the red circle. It protects the objective and most of the ground around it. Granted, the more or less cramped geography of this point helps with Level 3s. However, there are many major sightlines toward the Level 3. The aforementioned cramped space is a double edged sword. It can help Level 3s, but the overall scrappiness enabled by such geography allows the enemy team to apply great pressure, making it so that Level 3s are more difficult to deploy. A coordinated team or many enemies being in multiple places at once can apply too much pressure for the Level 3 to handle if there isn’t enough team support. It can be better to keep the area denial moving rather than to dig in one’s heels and doubling down on a potentially lost cause.

As for Point 4, the silos, the roofs, and the platforms overall give a lot of high ground for the Engineer to build Mini-Sentries and use the shotguns effectively. Because of the many sightlines and high ground options, the Engineer can constantly rotate through the various locations as his Mini-Sentries get destroyed and his positions become compromised.



Swiftwater 4th exemplifies Points 2 and 3. The blue circle indicates the wide open space that the enemy can control; a Level 3 indicated by the red circle cannot effectively cover this area. In addition, it is important to have some presence on the right side of the field. Not only does it watch the garage, but it also sets up for a nasty flank on the BLU team should they choose to push up the tracks to the medium packs.

There are some flaws to running Mini-Sentry defense:
1. The enemy Uber can simply focus on one high priority target: the Engineer’s combo: With normal Sentries, the enemy Uber must choose between the Sentry or the bulk of the defending team. If the Engineer decides to run Mini-Sentries, the Uber can be spent solely to fight the defending team.
2. The Engineer cannot provide a solid anchoring point of retreat and consolidation: Level 3s are very immobile but very strong. Where they are, they create a strong deterrent to the enemy. Such is why the destruction of a Level 3 is so important for the offensive team. Without the Level 3, the defending team will have a difficult time retreating to the safety of the Level 3.

Overall, the flaws of Mini-Sentry defense is that it is unstable and thus needs to be exercised with much caution. It can fall apart very quickly due to the lack of a strong and tanky Level 3. It can also not be worth the sacrifice of a Level 3, as the utility of strong area denial and tankiness at one or two key areas tends to be more important than the mobility and direct damage of the Combat Engineer. On defense, the Engineer should seek to die a grand total of 0 times. It is almost always best to retreat and invest in a solid defense on the next point. This comes into conflict with the Combat Engineer, as the playstyle requires aggression. This balance of aggression vs retreating is difficult to maintain and will require much experience and gamesense.


Speaking of Swiftwater, let’s look at an example. We will be looking at June: an Engineer who was playing in RGL Challenger in this video. While this isn’t the highest level of competitive play, Challenger is the division right underneath Invite at the time of this video, so this is a high enough level for consideration.

As mentioned recently, Swiftwater 4th has too much open space and thus a Level 3 cannot control the field, only the strip of land behind the wall of sheet metal. I must mention the caveat that this strip of land is very important to control. The team that controls this strip of land is the team that controls Swiftwater 4th. June is sacrificing something here. The Level 3 backup is crucial to protecting this piece of real estate.

Notice that June places the Dispenser more aggressively behind the metal sheets instead of the ramp that goes to last. This greatly supplements her forward combat engineering playstyle as the combo will be playing forward. With all this setup, she occupies the field and controls it. The enemy flank cannot comfortably leave the garage and cannot chase the injured flank. Another point is how occupying the field partially denies a BLU Sniper sightline, which is the window in the garage.

A critical note about Mini-Sentry defense in action is what happens at 0:10 and 2:23. BLU team is pushing the cart and pressing forward, yet they have positioned themselves vulnerable to June, her Mini-Sentry, and her Soldier on the flank! The BLU team needed to funnel down the tracks without flank support from the garage because June assisted in keeping it secure. This is pertinent even after the push. The Mini-Sentry in the field allowed some safety on the flank while June followed up post-fight. If she wanted, June could have wielded the Wrangler to pepper the enemy and deny a great deal of area from afar and even pincer the BLU team should they press too far forward.

In the video overall, we see that the RED Soldier bombed quite liberally. With June on the flank Mini-Sentry defense, the RED Soldier was free to bomb without totally surrendering the flank.

Lastly, observe how quickly June’s team lost 4th when the enemy team managed to get key picks and a foothold. Without a Level 3, it was difficult for June’s team to comfortably retreat. Due to June’s death on 4th, she was unable to have a Level 3 quickly to defend the final point later in this game.

DM is not just used in Combat Engineering situations. It is more than usable in a standard Level 3 defense setup. Firstly, the raw mechanics and aim greatly contribute to self-defense and independence. If the Engineer equips the Rescue Ranger, he closely ties his survivability with that of his Sentry. When the Sentry is destroyed, the Engineer is left very vulnerable. Even when the Engineer has his Sentry, he will have trouble fighting Spies sapping it. By using any of the shotguns, the Engineer can be more independent; he can duel Spies and still contribute to a fight when his Sentry is destroyed or far away.

The second major defensive situation where DM contributes greatly is collapsing on the attacking team with allies after a major teamfight. Recall that when it comes to Ubercharge exchanges, the Engineer is best suited to contribute after the Uber expires. Even if the Sentry survives the teamfight, a Level 3 is far too immobile to directly clean up enemies and chase them should the post-Uber fight take place where the Level 3 isn’t watching. The Engineer himself should engage instead. While a failed push causes some relative peace to the defenders, decimating any remaining enemies after the push ensures little to no follow up damage, further delays the next push, and allows defenders to retake ground they wouldn’t be able to under normal conditions.

Bullet jumping, as I’ve stated when I first discussed it, is an extremely niche skill. It should have a very low priority when it comes to training. However, I would still like to discuss its usefulness. It is useful for movement, sacrificing, obstacle avoidance and finding unorthodox positions for both the Engineer and the Mini-Sentry. It can serve as a lower quality Soldier bomb or rocket jump. As demonstrated by the Spamfest and Rh0mbus clips, while the Engineer does not have the damage output nor durability of the Soldier, the access to this new dimension of mobility allows for plays that were originally never accessible to the Engineer.


Because of how much setup bullet jumping requires, it is not useful to do constantly. For most jumps, the Engineer should not be placing Mini-Sentries primarily for the jump’s purpose. The best instance to bullet jump is when the Mini-Sentry is positioned in a way that simultaneously serves as area denial and a good angle for bullet jumping. Before the jump even happens, the Engineer must have the target or goal in mind. Where is the landing zone? What can I accomplish by quickly moving to this position? Why do I need to be there instead of here? Understand that bullet jumping will likely result in death as bullet jumps tend to send the Engineer deeper into combat, costs a considerable amount of health, and is risky due to the myriad of uncertainties at the destination.

When jumping for movement, the Engineer can be much more liberal with Mini-Sentry placement, as it is very likely that he will build a new one to secure his position. When it comes to sacrificing, he needs to be much more considerate, as the Mini-Sentry should be placed to do work after the Engineer’s death.

As for more direct combat, bullet jumping should be used to quickly catch up to and pick off high priority targets. Be observant of enemy positioning and health to jump on the opportunity. If possible, synergize with allies. It is worth asking if the bullet jump is worth it. The Combat Engineer won’t be available for at most 24 seconds after the jump because he will likely die from the engagement.

Another question to consider is if one wants the Mini-Sentry to survive after the jump. This goes back to a previous point where I mentioned that the Mini-Sentry should optimally be positioned in a way where it provides a good angle and position for a bullet jump and will at the same time serve the Mini-Sentry’s normal function. If the Mini-Sentry was mostly, if not purely, for jumping, then the well-being of the Mini-Sentry postmortem does not need to be a factor. Otherwise, it might be wiser to maintain the position a little longer before jumping. Additionally, one must consider if the disadvantage of the current Mini-Sentry placement is worth the potential benefit of the jump being successful. Holding ground will be much more impactful for most cases. Another factor to consider is what will happen to the buildings if the Engineer commits to a suicide pick attempt. In that case, it needs to be done when one is sure the buildings will undergo minimal tampering during respawn.

A simple situation where bullet jumping is appropriate is the beginning of Payload Offense. The beginning of the payload round tends to start with sacrifice waves where Demomen and Soldiers use their explosive jumping to rush the RED defenses. The Engineer can coordinate with these classes or follow up on their damage and initial shock.

When it comes to making a sacrifice bomb with the bullet jump in the context of allies doing the same thing, it is important that the Engineer jumps out of sync with any Soldier or Demoman. He should jump after the initial bomb. If he chooses to bullet jump with the bomb, he will take damage he cannot endure as most of the enemy team will notice him. By bullet jumping after his allies attack, he is landing in a teamfight with distracted and injured enemies occupied with the initial threats. The inverse can also be effective, albeit not as much as the first. If the Engineer bombs first, he can take the intial burst of damage and attention and leave an opening for his Soldier to rocket jump in. Once the Engineer lands, he should focus on a high priority class that is the least protected such as the Demoman, Heavy, or Sniper. People, especially good players, instinctively try to protect the Medic when there is a sudden aggressive play. These opponents are prime targets for a bullet jumping Engineer.

Another use of bullet jumping is the extra mobility to access harder to reach areas. A prime example of this is getting on top of the silos when defending with Mini-Sentries on Swiftwater third. The quick repositioning to higher ground can be useful in reinforcing allies or preparing to receive an enemy attack when there is little time.

The Primary weapon for bullet jumping matters the most when the Engineer is sacrificing for a trade or forcing an Uber.
Shotgun: As discussed, the Shotgun is an all around solid choice for any situation as a Combat Engineer, and bullet jumping is no different. If the Engineer somehow survives the bullet jump and the fight afterwards, he still has a reliable weapon.
Frontier Justice: This primary should only be used in conjunction with bullet jumping when the Engineer has Crits. It is high risk/high reward. The Crits can drop a player or even two but nothing more. The Frontier Justice’s reduced clip size can be considered negligible for bullet jumping as in most cases, the Engineer will only live for a few seconds after landing.
Panic Attack: This shotgun synergizes well for the purposes of bullet jumping primarily because of its faster deploy time and less risk of missing thanks to its bullet spread, giving some insurance. The Engineer must switch off of the Wrangler to his primary once the jump ends. Due to this, the faster deployment time allows the Engineer to shave off precious seconds to deal damage. The increased damage at very close range is a secondary reason it synergizes. Bullet jumping can land the Engineer right at the target’s face, which is perfect range for the increased pellet count of the Panic Attack.
Widowmaker: It is mediocre for bullet jumping. Again, the Engineer will at most pick off one or two people before dying, making the unlimited ammo capabilities of the Widowmaker is less impactful. However, there is a possible case where the Engineer might be able to secure a kill he wouldn’t have because the Widowmaker does not have to reload.

Out of the 3 levels in the stock Sentry, Level 1 Sentries are the most appropriate for bullet jumping. Bullets from any level above it do too much damage too quickly that it often isn’t practical unless the Engineer is somehow Ubered.

This Part will consist of commentaries and breakdowns of Combat Engineer gameplay. We covered a lot of material up to this point, and it is now time to see them in action. This Part will be dedicated to commentary and breakdowns of POVs from wax and Grynn. It is worth noting that these are from the RGL Invite Highlander division: the highest possible division in North America. Every player in these games has countless seasons of competitive experience.

I want to emphasize here again that while Combat Engineering or Dimension 1 is straightforward conceptually, it is not simplistic in execution. It requires mechanical finesse, timing, good understanding of the game, and quick decision making.

This Part does not contain any new information and material. If you are interested in only the concepts, you are free to skip this part entirely.

I want to note that the commentary will not cover every topic I discussed in this guide. The objective here is to see some concepts in action as they appear in these POVs.

While I will be focusing on the person in question, I will discuss the actions of the opposing Engineer when applicable.

For the two videos I cover, turn on the Subtitles/CC. The commentary I write here will also be on the video as subtitles. Some subtitles may last only a couple seconds, so pause the video if the information passes too quickly.

The first game I will cover is Grynn on Product.

General Notes:

• Grynn runs Pistol for this game instead of the Wrangler. It is worth noting that he does not place his Mini-Sentries in long sightlines to compensate for this. Instead, he generally places his Mini-Sentries more passively, protecting his team and the objective rather than using it to relentlessly pressure sightlines and enemy territory.
  
• Note that Grynn shoots at teammates, corners, and behind buildings and props to check for hiding Spies.
  
• He almost never pushes alone. He always pushes with his team, following them slightly behind. Grynn stays in cover while his teammates move in front of him before pushing himself.

0:08 - Grynn does not cross the point during the initial midfight. He deploys a Mini-Sentry behind the rock and protects his team from bombers, Spies, and overaggressive players.
0:13 - His Scout and Demoman start moving forward. Seeing this, he takes ground with the Scout. With this, Grynn and the Scout are able to put time on the point and eventually capture it.
0:28 - Seeing his Scout and Spy attacking the enemy team, Grynn decides to follow up and attack the enemy Heavy. When he realizes that the Heavy is focused on him, he rotates to see if there are targets on the other side of the rock. With lower health and too many enemies, he retreats and receives heals from the Medic.
0:39 - Grynn’s team has a notable numbers disadvantage. With heals and likely hearing from his teammates that the enemy Demoman is hurt, he moves in for the kill. With the Scout, he kills the enemy Demoman. He tries to go for the Sniper as well, another crucial pick, but does not manage to get the kill.
1:00 - On Product, the Engineer’s position when his team does not have the point is the area behind the Concrete called Grass.
1:12 - He encroaches on Concrete and commits to putting a Mini-Sentry there once he realizes there aren’t any enemies there. Also note that the Mini-Sentry is placed a little farther back. It doesn’t have the full sightline to Point and Cliff.
1:20 - Grynn’s team moves forward to capture the point. Grynn stays back to Spycheck, as this would be the prime time for a Spy to strike.
1:25 - After building the Mini-Sentry to support his team’s push, he goes to Spycheck again to find and kill the RED Spy.
1:29 - The RED Engineer has a Mini-Sentry on his Concrete and is Wrangling the Sentry towards Grynn’s team for long range damage as they attempt to capture the point. Seeing that the flank is distracted by the BLU Uber, Grynn decides to engage. He kills the Soldier instead of the Engineer as the Soldier is the bigger threat. The Soldier can pose a massive threat after the Uber is over, such as bombing Grynn’s team after the Uber fades.
1:47 - With the Point captured and the resulting downtime, Grynn builds a Dispenser in the Pocket. He also builds a passive Mini-Sentry to protect his team. He also looks behind his team to Spycheck.
2:09 - His team gets pressured out of the Point. Grynn retreats to Grass.
2:49 - His team begins to take the Point and Gyrnn follows up by taking the Concrete flank route. He places down a Mini-Sentry to cover point and helps the capture. Afterwards, he retreats to the flank, helps the Soldier the best he can, and intercepts a decloaking Spy.
3:13 - Grynn’s team Ubers. Again, he does not directly participate but instead waits for the Uber to clear space. The enemy, however, responds to the Uber with their own. Since the enemy has a better Uber, Grynn retreats and intercepts the enemy Soldier and Scout rushing in to kill his Medic after the Uber fades.
3:24 - The RED’s Uber faded and they committed their Scout and Soldier for nothing. BLU decides to recapture the Point. Grynn focus fires the Heavy and then pressures the RED team off of the point with his Pyro and Scout. I want to emphasize that Grynn pushed in with his team.
3:40 - From what I can see, he dropped this Mini-Sentry due to last minute pressure. He is low on health, and he was just on the enemy side of the map. If he was going to die, he might as well place a Mini-Sentry on the Point on the way out.
4:04 - Grynn does not overextend. He knows that he has no team support and there is a plethora of enemies on their concrete. He simply stays at his post and discourages enemy flanking attempts.
4:40 - I am unsure as to why Grynn decides to engage here almost alone. My best guess is to go for a pick on the Demoman or to delay the capture for as long as he can.
5:10 - In the next round, Grynn moves to the side opposite of his Combo and places a Mini-Sentry. He also moves to protect his Sniper.
5:18 - With no metal, Grynn is left to keep on the cliff or near his team to simply be another body that can fight the enemy. He guards the backline while his team captures and secures the Point.
5:45 - Seeing that his team has a good grasp of the Point and he doesn’t see the Spy, Grynn finally goes to get metal.
5:53 - This is an example of why building a Dispenser with no team presence is not recommended. The Dispenser doesn’t even finish building before being destroyed and he is caught out in his Grass by their Soldier with no Mini-Sentry to support him.
6:10 - This shows the more “set it and forget it” nature of Mini-Sentries. He places it in his Grass with little care for its exact positioning. As long it covers crucial ground and not too forward, any position in that general area is fine.
6:25 - Grynn’s team decides to move forward, and he follows up. He takes action and kills their Sniper. This is a major blow to the enemy team.
6:30 - He goes to the Connector to meet the RED Soldier. He disengages and goes around it instead, knowing that the open ground and the high ground from Crates is a much better way to fight him than the cramped Connector. The Soldier still takes a considerable amount of damage from both Grynn and his team. This is why he aggresses into the enemy Concrete to ultimately kill the enemy Soldier. He has high ground, leading to a rather easy finish. Even though he dies to the enemy Scout, this is a worthy trade.
6:50 - He stays passive. His team does not have the Point and he can see the RED Heavy pushing his team’s Cliff.
6:55 - While this is not the optimal Mini-Sentry placement, it is the best Grynn has. He is pressured by the Soldier and the more hidden spot is the best chance Grynn has to assure that the building completes.
7:00 - Grynn hunts down the retreated Soldier. He moves from side to side to dodge rockets. He even uses the low ground itself for cover, allowing Grynn to trade with the RED Soldier.
8:15 - The RED Demoman is open. He is the most forward with very few allies around him. Grynn jumps on the opportunity. Unfortunately, he gets headshot.
8:30 - The passive Mini-Sentry does work and it shows that even passive positions can be effective if the enemy is taking ground or playing aggressively.
8:55 - There is a fight going on the BLU Cliff. The RED team is distracted, and Grynn takes this as an opportunity to flank.
9:24 - Generally, a Combat Engineer should not boost the construction speed of the Dispenser. It should build on its own while the Engineer stays mobile and active. However, his team is holding behind the point and the downtime exists.
11:08 - With his team pushing, Grynn feels safe putting down a Dispenser and Mini-Sentry. He then retreats to cover the backlines.
11:27 - This is an unfortunate decloak by the RED Spy. His timing was correct, as the RED team does Uber into Grynn’s team. Note that Grynn stays back in the Uber. He knows that Engineer cannot participate right away but rather after the Uber is over.

11:37 - With the RED Uber faded and with his team having a numbers disadvantage, Grynn moves in for a kill. He tries to use the Rock to pick at different angles but unfortunately Grynn does not find any vulnerable targets.
12:20 - Grynn attempts to advance on the RED Demoman but he is protected by the RED Mini-Sentry. Grynn cannot aggress and goes to show that even though the Mini-Sentry has less firepower than a stock Sentry, it still serves as a powerful deterrent. It also prevents Grynn from walking onto the Point for free.
13:18 - A small act of courtesy to the BLU Soldier. He needs health much more than Grynn does.
13:28 - Grynn notices that the RED Heavy is retreating and distracted by an ally. Grynn takes this opportunity to kill him.
13:34 - Another example of area denial from the RED Mini-Sentry. Grynn wants to aggress further, but he now has to retreat. He cannot even put time on the Point but instead deal chip damage at the enemy team with the Shotgun and Pistol.
14:04 - Good discipline. He does not overextend. He does not have enough metal for a Mini-Sentry and he isn’t sure what he is running into.
15:14 - This is a rather important lesson to learn. A Combat Engineer can be with his team and supporting them but the tide of battle can quickly turn, suddenly leaving the Texan in a bad situation.
15:45 - While his team fights in an Uber, Grynn stays back to capture the Point.
15:58 - With downtime, Grynn constructs his remaining buildings.
16:07 - Grynn repositions his Mini-Sentry to be more passive. This is due to his lack of a Wrangler. He still places the Mini-Sentry to deny any enemies that decide to overaggress to force Grynn’s team from the objective.
16:18 - Grynn’s team sees the RED Soldier jumping to their Concrete. By flanking on the high ground, Grynn secures the kill with his Soldier. We also see the downside of the Wrangler here, as the RED Engineer was occupied Wrangling across the Point.
16:47 - Grynn is in trouble. He uses the low ground to take cover from the RED Spy. He manages to deal enough damage to make his opponent retreat.
17:17 - Excellent aim.
18:49 - This is a benefit of the Pistol over the Wrangler. He can easily deal chip damage to the enemies on his Concrete without relying on his Mini-Sentry nor does he have to reposition his building to get the sightline.
19:14 - The next two Mini-Sentries are placed quite passively on Concrete as it doesn’t watch the Connector. This is because the enemy Soldier is already spamming rockets at the Connector, so Grynn must build passively to give the Mini-Sentry better chances to complete. These two Mini-Sentries still deny Point.
19:25 - While his Soldier fights in Connector, Grynn watches his 6 for the Spy.
19:51 - With no metal and his team not having the Point, the most stable thing Grynn can do right now is deal chip damage with his Shotgun.
20:20 - Now that he has 100 Metal and his team moving up, Grynn proceeds to the Concrete, deploys a passive Mini-Sentry and plays the flank.
20:43 - The power of the Frontier Justice shines. The RED Engineer was able to cleave the BLU Heavy that was trying to pressure the Connector with a crit.
20:58 - I have no idea why Grynn decided to go to Spawn. If I had to guess, it is because Grynn heard from a teammate that there was a Spy behind so he went to inspect. Seeing no Spy, he possibly just wanted to restock on Metal.
21:13 - It is worth pointing out the RED Mini-Sentry’s area denial. Grynn cannot even enter Grass and is forced to just chip it down. The RED Soldier had a clear passage to rocket jump from Concrete because the RED Mini-Sentry created the room.
22:50 - With the RED Uber fading, Grynn moves with his team to defend the Point. With the Mini-Sentry behind him, he is able to do some damage to the enemy team before having to retreat.

The second game is wax on Ashville.

General Notes:

• wax makes excellent use of the Frontier Justice, getting key picks and dealing massive damage.
  
• He adjusts his Mini-Sentry placement slightly to make sure there are better Wrangler sightlines.
  
• wax generally stays back during Uber exchanges. The Engineer does not have the raw mobility, firepower, and durability to contribute.

0:19 - wax goes to the Battlements (Batts). On this map, Soldiers love to jump over their roof to the enemy Batts to harass and flank the enemy. Scouts, Detonator Pyros, and Engineers can also climb onto the roof and start harassing. Wax’s presence and the Mini-Sentry are here to discourage this.
0:20 - The RED Scout attempts to get on the BLU Batts which wax punishes.
0:23 - The Combat Engineer serving as a flanker and staying away from the main Combo force shines here. The RED team is distracted by the retreating BLU Combo and chases them to the BLU Ramp. wax flanks the Pyro to protect his Combo and immediately jumps on the Demoman to help his team secure the Point.
0:34 - Seeing the rocket at the Shutter, wax goes to address the RED Soldier that is behind his team while his team captures the Point. Seeing that he is not as close as initially thought, wax goes to finish the capture.
0:52 - His Dispenser placement is worth a short discussion. It is still behind cover and allows his allies to safely gather. However, it is out of the way so that any Demoman explosive spam over the BLU Roof will not damage it nor the allies.
0:55 - He builds his Dispenser and Teleporter since the initial Midfight is over and he has the downtime. He returns to his flank role on Batts.
1:49 - wax stays at Spawn to build up his Teleporter Entrance. This can be a waste of time in certain contexts. However, because the enemy team is busy capturing the Point, his Exit is already built, and most of his team is dead, he has nothing better to do. Although the Exit is eventually killed, the concept is what is important here.
2:03 - He upgrades the Teleporter. wax expects to stay on the battlefield as long as possible and likely won’t have time nor metal to upgrade the Teleporter once he is out there. He has the downtime, as his team needs to retake lost ground and prepare to push the objective.
2:18 - Recall the matchup about the Heavy. He was able to do substantial damage on the Heavy because he caught him off guard. Even though his Demoman killed the RED Heavy, wax could have finished the job on his own.
2:24 - RED uses their Uber. wax backs off as he knows he has no place in this fight. He simply does what damage he can while standing back, eventually retreating to Batts to protect the flank and his Sniper.
2:55 - wax places his Mini-Sentry in a very passive spot. It doesn’t directly watch the roof and the Point. However, it is a safe location and can catch overextending players off guard. After safely constructing the building, wax quickly moves it so it has more surface area.
3:02 - Again, he gets the jump on the Heavy. The enemy team is distracted with wax’s team allowing him to get free shots. Note that he uses the crates as cover while keeping an eye on his right. He turns his focus to the RED Soldier coming from Under in a flank attempt as he is the more immediate threat. He comes back to finish off the RED Heavy. It does not matter that wax aggressed onto the enemy Ramp to get killed by their Scout. He did plenty of work and his team secured the Point.
3:57 - wax places the Mini-Sentry on the Fans with the intent to Wrangle it. Note the incredible sightlines and the coverage on the Point. He ends up stepping off the high ground and moves forward as there are no enemies in the sightline. After killing the Soldier and starting his Dispenser construction, he returns to the Batts.
4:38 - The power of a Wrangled Mini-Sentry is on display. He is able to apply a good deal of long range damage while staying back and on high ground. Unfortunately, the enemy Spy used this opportunity to stab wax.
5:30 - This is an awkward situation. RED Ubers their Scout through the BLU Shutter and wax is the first enemy they meet. He bodyblocks the Scout to protect his Medic. Their Scout ends up killing wax’s Medic in the end, but wax limits the RED Uber to the best of his ability.
5:53 - wax deploys a very passive Mini-Sentry in his Lobby. This is likely due to the fact that his team has little control of the Batts. He then escorts his Medic to the rest of the BLU team.
6:05 - Here we have another Wrangled Mini-Sentry. While the Mini-Sentry was destroyed rather quickly, it had a significant impact on the fight. The RED Demoman needed to focus down the 300 HP building a little out of his optimal range. He was not focused on the BLU Pyro and Heavy. Every second counts when a KOTH round is ending and wax buys his team precious seconds.
6:20 - wax uses the EE + Gunslinger cheaper Teleporter upgrade trick. His deployed Teleporter now requires 100 Metal despite wearing a Gunslinger.
6:33 - This fight with the Soldier shows why having a Mini-Sentry by the Engineer’s side is so important, especially when he is alone. wax is able to trade with the Soldier, which certainly favors the BLU team.
6:49 - With one kill on the Mini-Sentry from the exchange earlier, wax switches to Frontier Justice.
7:14 - wax deploys a Mini-Sentry to help his team push the Point. He also goes Under to support his Soldier fighting the RED Soldier.
7:16 - The power of the Frontier Justice shines. Wax was able to kill the RED Soldier with a 126 damage crit from mid range. This damage is impossible on any other Engineer primary.
7:22 - While wax does have a Mini-Sentry watching the Point, he decides to rebuild a more aggressive one.
7:55 - This shows that even one aggressive player can warrant running the Frontier Justice for longer. The RED Soldier bombed his team to make a play, as the RED team does not have the Point.
7:56 - wax makes quick use of these Crits. He finds the RED Demoman on the Fans and engages. With 2 well-placed shots, wax lands the kill! This is a massive play. Without their Demoman, RED just lost a lot of pushing and spamming power. If the RED team was going to make a push, they cannot make it now. It is also worth pointing out that wax could have used the Crits to zone the Demoman, forcing him to retreat with the threat of the Crits.
8:28 - Another Wrangled Mini-Sentry. With a generous sightline, wax peppers enemies coming from their Shutter and kills the RED Soldier that forced his Medic’s Uber.
8:38 - He moves the Mini-Sentry to the left. This is to provide the Mini-Sentry cover from the enemy Batts while still covering the Point.
8:48 - After engaging with the Spy who attempted to kill the BLU Sniper, wax stands between possible decloak spots and the Sniper to preemptively intercept the Spy.
9:12 - wax places his Mini-Sentry to deter the chasing Scout and to preserve his Crits. wax is in no condition to fight, even with 2 Crits. He has low health and no allies around him. Note that he looks around as he retreats to spawn to make sure a potential Spy doesn’t decloak to finish him off.
9:26 - He upgrades the Teleporter to Level 2. This is faster thanks to the EE Trick. He has downtime as his team has little presence due to low numbers. Unfortunately, the Teleporter gets sapped.
10:00 - wax has a strong defensive position here to protect his team from any potential assailants. He has a passive Mini-Sentry and Crits.

10:08 - Seeing the explosives, wax knows that the RED Demoman is near. The Frontier Justice shines again. With 3 clean Crit shots, wax kills the RED Demoman. Such damage would not have been possible with any other Engineer primary. This is an extremely valuable pick. RED lost their primary damage dealer. They are losing numbers now and are forced to Uber to preserve the Point.
11:42 - Pristine mechanics at work. He meatshots the RED Soldier that jumped into his Batts. He didn’t even need a Mini-Sentry.
12:20 - Seeing that his team is well protected, wax goes Under to set up any potential flanking maneuvers.
12:38 - Good discipline here. wax does not have a large enough distraction to move in. He deals chip damage with his Shotgun. He either does not have time to build a new Mini-Sentry or wants the Mini-Sentry in Under to cover his retreat.
12:44 - With the BLU Heavy getting closer to the enemy, wax moves in. The Scout cleans up, but wax could have done massive followup damage should he have been allowed to proceed.
13:10 - Good timing. RED Soldier dies to wax’s Mini-Sentry while he is in spawn. He switches to the Frontier Justice.
13:31 - wax goes to protect the flank and eventually go Under in conjunction with his team’s Uber. He catches the Soldier off guard and quickly bursts down the injured Heavy retreating from the Uber exchange.
13:43 - wax doesn’t push the issue too much. The enemy team knows he is here and is likely expecting him. He builds a Mini-Sentry and waits until the coast is clear. Notice how he moves after the RED Demoman detonates his Stickies.
14:03 - Seeing no viable targets, wax retreats through Under, using his previously built Mini-Sentry to cover his fallback.
15:00 - wax usually covers Batts, but he decides on holding the Roof next to Ramp. This is likely due to the lack of teammates around the Medic.
15:13 - This shows that even medium-long range Shotgun blasts can be a good deterrent. The RED Soldier needed to wait longer before rocket jumping.
15:25 - RED Ubers onto the Point. wax is forced to stay on Roof, as that is the safest place to fight the enemy team while staying away from his own.
16:08 - The RED Mini-Sentry at the entrance of Under denies the Scout and Engineer from making any sorts of moves through Under. wax is forced to chip it down while his team concerns themselves with higher priority targets.
16:41 - wax goes straight to Batts instead of going through Lobby to build a Teleporter on the way there. This is likely in anticipation of the RED Soldier, as he jumped to the BLU Batts often. This is reinforced by wax waiting for a rather long time and Wrangling the Sentry before going to build the Teleporter.
17:19 - Note how he clears the Stickies with his Shotgun, allowing classes like the Heavy and Pyro to pay more attention to incoming enemies.
17:25 - wax picks up the Mini-Sentry to save Metal and pushes behind his team. The RED Demoman wastes some Stickies on wax’s Mini-Sentry. This was proper play. However, the enemy team defends the BLU Uber well. BLU is almost wiped, including wax.
17:56 - wax adjusts his overall positioning. While he does focus on the Batts, his team is heading there now. To cover the flank, wax goes to the left. He also deploys the Mini-Sentry passively as he sees aggressive enemies in the Lobby.
18:05 - wax shows good patience here. He knows the Heavy is trained on him and he cannot directly engage alone. He pounces on and kills the Heavy when he is assaulted by other teammates.
18:32 - I am not sure why wax decided to drop down to Under. It could be to get as close as possible to the bombing Soldier and/or to hide close to the RED Uber to flank them after the Uber fades. Seeing his situation, wax contents himself with staying and securing Under.
18:49 - This shows how good mechanics itself can be a form of area denial. The RED Soldier does not push his luck with wax even though he has the high ground. wax does not chase as he is still on low ground.
18:58 - There is good use of the Wrangler here. He stays in the middle of Under and uses the Wrangler to pepper enemies coming from either of the two entrances while staying a respectable distance away. Being in the middle is also good because he has access to the Medium Health and Ammo packs.
19:19 - wax finally escapes Under as his team starts taking ground and goes to protect his Sniper. This is important.
19:30 - While his team is on the right side of the map, wax is on the Ramp protecting his Sniper to make sure the latter can make a pick to give the BLU team an opening to push. The mere fact that the Sniper is somewhere is enough to cause some uneasiness. With his Sniper retreating from the Spy, wax secures Ramp for his team. He needs to be passive as he is alone.
19:43 - wax moves the Mini-Sentry further to start pressuring the enemy team with the Wrangler. Note that he did this moveup because his team is encroaching on the point.
19:50 - Instead of participating in the fight directly, wax stays back and checks the backline. This pays off, as he finds the RED Spy and forces him to back off. That Spy could have killed wax’s Sniper and/or Heavy, which would have greatly weakened the BLU Uber and the post-Uber fight.
20:05 - This new Mini-Sentry is to cover the Point and to Wrangle enemies from afar if need be. It helps his team secure the Point, cleaning up the remaining RED members after the Uber exchange.
20:42 - Despite having 4 Crits on the Frontier Justice, he has the discipline to not take a shot at the Spy. He knows the Crit will not deal substantial enough damage with the Spy taking cover and cloaking. He picks up the Ammo and moves to secure Roof with his Mini-Sentry.
20:58 - The RED team is itching for a fight and pressuring Roof. wax falls back to the Batts to separate himself from the rest of his team and take a more passive position to support his team from behind.
21:10 - As the enemy push comes to a close, wax tries to go for a flank through Under. This is the best time to do it. Remember that the best time for the Combat Engineer to strike is after a major fight and not during it. This pays off as he kills the enemy Engineer, Demoman, and pressures the Sniper out with his 4 Crits.
21:40 - wax places his Mini-Sentry passively to Wrangle into the enemy Uber. wax and his Mini-Sentry dies during the Uber but this is actually fantastic. RED spent a good portion of that Uber killing wax and his Mini-Sentry instead of the rest of his allies. The Uber accomplished very little and his team was able to prevent the RED team from capturing the Point.
22:50 - Upgrading the Teleporter can make or break this round. Note that the RED team’s timer is 0:00. All they need to do is capture the Point to win the round. In times like this, every second wax can save for allies is precious.
23:11 - In every other circumstance, this play would be stupidly aggressive. But wax has no choice. If RED captures, his team loses the round. It was a valiant effort, but RED won.
23:49 - wax goes for an aggressive play, seeing that the RED team is distracted. Using the crates as cover, he kills the Heavy and finishes off the Spy before retreating to Under.
24:03 - wax and his Spy poke their heads out of Under to see if they can go for a flank. They don’t find too much and eventually fall prey to their Pyro and Engineer. At the very least, they were left on their last legs.
24:35 - BLU Ubers and wax stays behind to watch the backlines. The Soldier tries to climb onto Batts to harass BLU’s Sniper. wax does not manage to secure the kill on the Soldier when trying to flank him.
26:08 - I’m not quite sure how the RED Engineer made it there, but he makes the right play in killing the BLU Sniper.
27:18 - Jumping on the RED Demoman is appropriate here. He is overextended and wax can feasibly close the distance. He doesn’t kill the Demoman but at least makes him retreat.

27:44 - While his team Ubers, wax stays back to Spycheck and waits to follow up.
27:48 - With his team pushed up and the backline inspected, wax attacks.
28:29 - Much like last round, this is a last ditch effort from wax. If the RED Team captures the Point, they not only win the round, but the best of 5 the two teams are playing. He tries to buy as many seconds as possible, trading for their Engineer and Scout, but to no avail.

I have done commentary on two POVs. The link below is a playlist of POVs from wax and Grynn, including the two I covered which are the first two videos. The rest are for independent study of POVs you can observe and do not have Subtitles/CC

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFRgV8w886z-y6MSWew0gJxXf_WMZNT4J

This playlist consists of videos where Sigafoo reviews his matches. While any of these videos are good learning material for Combat Engineering and learning the mindset of Dimension 1, they are also great for learning Engineer in general.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLOBDczIS8PzvlorBdA-CFAqIqtPgzBshQ

Like anything in this world, there is future development. Anything can be improved even if the changes are miniscule. There are not many large developments for the Combat Engineer as of writing this.

As of right now, Combat Engineer has yet to reach its full potential because a good number of Engineer mains, and even those who consider themselves Combat Engineers, shirk on continuously refining their DM. Due to the nerfs in the Wrangler and Mini-Sentry over TF2’s many years, the Engineer’s role in the competitive meta has grown significantly more defensive, spending more time defending key players than taking a more active offensive job. While there is still room for aggressive and proactive play, none of this is possible without clean mechanics.Without excellent DM and superb mechanics among many Engineers, I do not think that the Combat Engineer can evolve or progress beyond its current state. As stated, one can have the theory and the concepts, but without the mechanics and DM, it will not manifest in reality.

However, once there is a significant quantity of Engineers with impeccable DM, players can begin to make innovations in the area.

• Refining tactics
  
• Combat Engineering in unorthodox positions
  
• Implementation of DM permeating more of Engineer's play

While Combat Engineering (Dimension 1) is conceptually forthright and simple, it is a proven and powerful method with its nuances and complications. Because the Engineer is a support class, this style of play is not without its difficulties. The Combat Engineer needs to develop sharp mechanics and good gamesense to deal as much damage as possible. He also uses a proactive mindset, and increased mobility to pressure the enemy while still supporting his team. It is a power many Engineer mains have not attained to its fullest but results in consistent effectiveness and moments of glory.

We discussed the following components of becoming a competent Combat Engineer:
1. Improving Mechanics
2. Class Matchups
3. Weapons
4. Combat and Tactics

There was also an additional section with two commentaries of Combat Engineer oriented Engineers playing at the highest level of Highlander that shows the concepts in action.

As in anything, developing these skills, internalizing the concepts, and applying them in game will take consistent practice and time. Hopefully this paper serves as an excellent manual to learn this methodology. Thank you for your time.

A very special thanks to Grynn and wax. This paper would not have reached its level of comprehensiveness, detail, and practicality if it wasn’t for your contributions. Thank you for choosing to be part of this.

Editing: The Grandmaster and my brother.
Audio Engineering: Mothership
Bullet Jumping Information: Rh0mbus and Austin
Gunslinger Cover Art: Dr.Cogenheïmer
Interview SFM Posters: Jeagle_g

Listed below is an unlisted playlist of unlisted videos on YouTube. This contains a series of voice interviews I had with wax and Grynn.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFRgV8w886z_ZcrHQnxDkA66Xy8TFaFSJ

There is one more paper I definitely want to write: Dynamic Engineering (Dimension 2). This is about optimization and customization to allies and enemies and is the only Dimension that I have yet to cover.

Another essay is an examination of the best Engineers of all time: Spamfest, Jordan_, Josh, and Ender. I do not think I will have enough data and information to pull this one off.

Of Pioneers and Dimensions: https://gtm.you1.cn/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1301053770
Bizarre Taxonomy (Dimension 3): https://gtm.you1.cn/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2111311706

10/24/2022: Updated Circle Strafing Playlist. Original one was removed.