You probably already know about it, but just a little fun info:
Team Fortress 2 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
An excerpt:
[edit] Classes
The nine playable classes have all returned from the original
Team Fortress, with the possibility of new classes being introduced after the initial release.
[23] Classes are grouped into three categories to help new players but can be played in any role; they are offense, defense, and support.
[19] One difference between
Team Fortress 2 and the original is that each class is more unique and abilities have been added, changed and removed to make each class a completely different playing experience.
[19] One of the most prominent of these changes is the removal of hand-thrown grenades from every class.
[19]
The scout.
[edit] Scout
The scout is lightly armored and is displayed as a young man, with a
Brooklyn accent, wearing
running shoes, a
baseball cap with a thin headset,
dog tags and carrying a
messenger bag over a team-colored t-shirt. The fastest class in the game, the scout's role is to capture objectives once enemy defenses have been disabled and as such a scout represents two players when capturing points.
[20] Scouts are able to double jump, giving extra height to a leap and allowing a change of direction in mid-air, and when combined with his natural speed this makes the scout a difficult target to hit. Armed with an
underlever shotgun, a
pistol and an aluminum
baseball bat, the scout is able to deliver significantly more damage at close range than in previous
Team Fortress incarnations.
[20]
[edit] Soldier
The soldier is a slow moving class, but has a high damage tolerance and can boost himself to higher platforms by
rocket jumping, though rocket jumping still causes damage accordingly. Speaking with a barrel-chested military drawl -- a nod towards
George C. Scott's performance in the film
Patton -- the soldier wears a team-colored American
World War II army uniform and carries a
rocket launcher, a
shotgun and can use an
entrenching tool for melee attacks. Used for spearheading offensives through firepower, the soldier is well suited to long range combat as his rockets have infinite range and cause area damage on impact.
[20]
The soldier was given a video in the "Meet the Classes" series, where he is shown talking to supposed blue players about military strategy, involving a misinformed lecture on the role of
Sun Tzu as the inventor of combat, as well as being involved in a variation on the life of
Noah. At the end of the lecture it is later revealed that the blue "players" are only severed heads of enemies that he has killed in the preceding battle.
The pyro.
[edit] Pyro
The pyro is equipped with a short-range
flamethrower, a
shotgun and a
fire axe. Unlike its counterparts in previous
Team Fortress incarnations, the pyro's primary weapon, the flamethrower, is one of the most powerful short range weapons in the game, able to set enemies on fire to cause damage over an extended period of time. Other pyros cannot be set alight, but will still take damage from the initial attack.
[20] Due to the short range of the flamethrower, the pyro relies on ambushing enemies to achieve the full effect of his weapon.
[edit] Demoman
The demoman is a defensive class with average damage tolerance. Speaking with an intoxicated
Scottish brogue, the demoman wears a skull cap, an eyepatch and a team-coloured
EOD suit. Demomen are armed with a timed detonation
grenade launcher, a remote detonation
sticky bomb launcher and use a
Scotch bottle that can be broken for melee attacks. The demoman can use these grenade launchers to fire grenades over obstacles and around corners, though its range is extremely limited. Sticky bombs can also be used in a defensive role for setting traps and
mining routes, although the opposing team can displace them with most weapons. The demoman can only have a maximum of eight active sticky bombs at any one time and placing more sticky bombs with eight already in place will begin detonating previously-deployed bombs in the order they were launched. Demomen can also use their explosives to
jump, when timed well this can send the Demoman to great heights but takes a lot of damage. The demoman moves slightly slower than most other classes.
[20]
In one of the trailers for
Team Fortress 2, the demoman was shown throwing a four-stick of dynamite, which corresponded to the MIRV demoman grenade from the original
Team Fortress Classic. This weapon however is not currently present in the game.
The demoman received a video in the "Meet the Classes" series in October 2007. In it, the demoman is shown as a severe alcoholic with an annoyed attitude, noting bitterly that as a "black Scottish cyclops" he is quite rare. He also seems to be jealous of people with two eyes.
[24]
The heavy.
[edit] Heavy
The heavy is the toughest physical class in the game. This large character speaks with a thick
Slavic accent, carries a large, heavy and very powerful
minigun and wears a
Kevlar vest over a team-colored shirt. His secondary weapons are a shotgun and his bare fists. The slowest of the nine classes, the heavy is used for both offensive and defensive purposes. The minigun itself has a short wind-up time and its low accuracy limits a heavy to medium and short range combat. The combination of high health, a large body and a powerful weapon commonly allows
medics to take cover behind heavies.
[20]
Valve released a video about the heavy as part of its "meet the class" advertisement series. In it, the heavy seemed very obsessed with his weapon, citing its enormous costs of maintenance and use, becoming extremely angry when he believes someone else has handled it, and even giving it a name, calling it Sacha. This video was later translated and revoiced into his native language,
Russian.
[edit] Engineer
Engineers are used to defend bases and passageways, as well as to supply and transport the team. Only lightly armored, the engineer wears a construction hat and team-colored overalls and speaks with a
Texan accent. The engineer is able to build various structures through "metal" points to support the team: a
sentry gun that can be upgraded through three stages of effectiveness, a teleporter matrix consisting of an entry and exit facility, and a dispenser that gives teammates ammunition and health. While its ammunition supplies are infinite, the dispenser requires time to regenerate metal supplies
[20]. Metal is collected from resupply points, dispensers, the weapons of fallen players, and even the debris of destroyed structures. Engineers are armed with a shotgun and a pistol in addition to a
monkey wrench that serves as a means to repair, upgrade, and speed up the building of structures
[20], while doubling as a melee weapon.
Valve released a short movie about the engineer in its advertisement series, "Meet the Classes". In it, the engineer is shown as a both laid-back and intellectual
Good Ol' Boy, sitting around drinking beer and playing a 6-string
acoustic guitar while the sentry guns he set up shoot at enemies. Although multiple sentry guns are seen in this video, an engineer can only build one of each structure at a time, although other engineers can also maintain this equipment. When an engineer dies, any equipment he built remains in the game until it is destroyed or until he changes classes.
The medic.
[edit] Medic
Medics are tasked with keeping other players alive and are equipped accordingly. With average protection and clothed in a doctor's labcoat and thick team-colored rubber gloves, the medic speaks with a
German accent. Armed with a healing gun, the medic is able to quickly and continuously regenerate a teammate's health up to 150% of their initial health. The medic can also use the healing gun to "Übercharge" other players after using the device for a certain amount of time. Übercharge renders the medic and the targeted teammate invulnerable for up to ten seconds. The healing gun cannot be used in an offensive capacity, although the medic is equipped with a
Flechette gun that shoots
syringes and a bonesaw to defend himself. The syringes fired are proper projectiles and so are subject to gravity; as such, since they are fired at quite a low speed, they drop the ground fairly quickly and for longer range targets a fair degree of elevation is required to obtain the necessary range. Medics are able to slowly regenerate their own health passively and are second in speed only to the scout
[20].
[edit] Sniper
Snipers are a support class. An
Australian[25] character with low damage tolerance, the sniper wears an
Akubra of Australian military Slouch Hat style
[26] and yellow tinted shooter's glasses. Carrying a bolt-action
sniper rifle, the sniper is able to kill all classes instantly with a shot to the head, although he must "charge" his rifle in order for the shot to be fatal against tougher targets, such as the heavy. Charging occurs while aiming with the scope, and a percentage bar on the right side of the crosshair indicates the amount that the rifle has been charged. However, the rifle leaves a visible team-colored
laser dot where it is aimed which can reveal imminent danger for the target. For closer combat, the sniper is armed with a
submachine gun and a
machete.
[20]
The spy.
[edit] Spy
The spy is lightly armored and is used for infiltrating, assassinating and sabotaging the enemy team and is capable of disguising himself as any class on either side. When undisguised, the spy speaks with a
Franco-
Spanish accent, and wears a team-coloured, pin-stripe suit with a team-coloured, full-face
balaclava. He wields a
revolver, a
butterfly knife, an electric sapper, and a disguises
kit[20]. While disguised, allies perceive the spy as usual but with a paper
mask of the class he is disguised as over his face, penetrated by an always-present cigarette. Spies randomly use an alias name of an enemy, occasionally having his cover blown by the player he is mimicking. Spies can take damage when disguised, although most of the time this is not immediately apparent. Since teammates can no longer damage each other, players often shoot their allies simply at the risk of them being a spy. Spies also have the ability to
cloak for a maximum of ten seconds. This cloak must recharge after use
[20], and can be disrupted by enemy fire, contact with an enemy player or by being set alight by the pyro's flamethrower. Spies cannot attack through the cloak, but they can disguise whilst cloaked and vice versa. Using a combination of cloaking and disguises allows spies to infiltrate the enemy team with little trouble, although a spy must be careful to avoid being spotted cloaking or decloaking. Spies also carry
electronic sappers that are placed on enemy structures, disabling them and slowly damaging them to destruction unless an engineer repairs their sabotaged equipment. A spy's disguise is not lost when he places a sapper.
[20].