Engineer Support

It's widely known that the three class groupings are misleading- heavies and demos make excellent attackers, whilst accurate scouts make devestating defenders. Melee snipers and battle medics can even be classified as attack classes, even though they're classes as support (so get on supporting!)

The engineer grouping is, I think, the most misleading. Two games today helped solidify my opinion.

game 1- 9 on 9, Goldrush, defence. We had a 5 strong engineer team. Each build up sentries by point 1. We were steamrolled by ubered demomen and spy combinations.
game 2- 9 on 9, 2Fort, highlander. As a purely defensive engineer, I ended the game with a killeath ratio of 5 to 23. The last 3 kills came from me turning into an offensive engineer, putting SG's in the water.

The engineer is, in my opinion, a support class. My reasons?
*3 out of 4 of his deployables are geared towards helping his team indirectly (the dispenser and teleport)
*His lacklustre health and basic stock weaponry prevent him from engaging in head on combat and coming out alive. Any engineer can plunge into the fray, but very few will come back in anything other than a bodybag.
*The sentry is a weapon of suprise. Yes, it will shred scouts and any unaware class, but people wise up. This brings me neatly to my next point-
*The sentry is both dumb and immobile. It locks on, it fires at whatever enemy's closest to it. If you dodge, get far enough away, circle strafe it or sap it whilst it's alone, it's toast. It can't intelligently hit classes such as the scout and the demoman who doge in and out of cover, lock onto good circle strafing pyros and can't move to attack ranged rockets or sniper bullets.
*Uber vulnerabiltiy- an uber demo/ heavy/ pyro/ soldier is heaving your way- o shi-. You run. A sentry fires and is blown up by any competent uberee, so long as they get close.

A counter arguement- but Numenor, I've had 10 (or 100, or 1000, or whatever) kills with a sentry and we've won the game! Not to mention all the scouts I've stopped!
True, an engineer excels at stopping rushes- but in my mind that's the only real defence aspect of him. As for the 10 kills- any engineer that does well is (most of the time) on a good team. An example is stage 3, point 1, Dustbowl. Setting up by the stairs opposite the driop down window from spawn, an engineer will either rack up kills if his team helps kill the enemy medics and push the enemy back. In a team with poor team support, the enemy will have little to distract them from their target- to blow up the engineer's vulnerable sentries.


This isn't trying to improve the engineer- nothing is wrong with the engineer, and can often be the only thing that stands between a successful enemy push and a failed one. But to everyone out there who believes their CP/ Intellignece is safe 'cos it's guarded by an engineer, think again- he won't last forever.

All classes are any kind of class, depending how you play them. The Engineer is mostly for support for sure, in the area denial and map control area. Sentries are psychological weapons really, enemies dont go near them, meaning the Sentry probably wont get alot of kills, but it will prevent enemies from coming near an area.

Teleporters help win games, that's a fact.

If you can get an exit with a dispenser nearby, somewhere close to the objective, you've done a hell of a lot of good for the team. Engineers earn points both from teleports and healing from dispensers. The sentry is something you should worry about building if if it is crucial to your survival in the area you've decided to build in.

In competitive games, the Engineer is only useful for denying Scouts access to the intel. Other than that, any combat class that rolls in normally spells doom for the sentry, but that's where the rest of your team comes in. Some teams even use their Engineers alongside the offensive push, spraying shotty, running the flag and placing exits. It's clever and very useful.

For me its more like depending on the map and the role my team is having. If we're on the attack team, I'll go offensive style. Just dump a sentry somewhere close to the control point or the check point, but hidden from most people. Then just treat my engineer as a class without buildings and help my team push with my weapons. Then put a dispenser around that area when we actually got the point. Then do the same thing with the rest of the check/control point etc. Then same with defending, but instead move the buildings backwards when needed be. However I would try to get my sentry to level 2-3 for defending, and 1-2 for attacking. Now for intel maps, I would stick to defense because my base is where my intel is. If I can get a dispenser and sentry within my base and patrol the area, for me I think I'm also being supportive because my team would have a place to fall back to.

The engineer isnt just about his sentry, in pubs you can get away with aggressive engineering.  You can get away with throwing down a level 1 sentry and then hunting for more metal with the shotgun and pistol.

But competitively its a completely different story.  You need the engineer to control when the enemy uber goes off.  90% of the time they need to pop uber to kill the sentry.  Defensive engineer doesnt give you kills or points, but they are a vital role in clan play on certain maps.

Quote:
Thats because you put them in the weirdest freaking places and they keep killing me.


I don't think that you can classify any of the classes. It all depends on how the player/team uses that class. Although Engies are probably more of a defensive class because its a lot easier to run back into the spawn and get 200 metal then run around looking for it. He's both a defensive and support class in my opinion.

Quote:

Heh you got me I don't play competitively...just a casual pub server engy here

It's true that all classes can fill each group, even if they fill in a niche area. I guess I'm more frustrated with teams that assume a team of engineers will defend the intel, when without team support they will fail. Chro's and Hellblazer's points about the sentry being at best a distraction rather than a threat are quite interesting; sentries are disposable items that both act as deterrents and enemy uber magnets, sliding engineers into an interesting defensive/ support blend class.

If the intel/ CP is guarded by another sentry manned by another engineer, I'll go into assault mode- rather than wrenching people to death though, I like to stick to suprise sentry spots and shotting unaware enemies before luring them to their automated sentry gun doom. Soldiers and demos that could easily shred a level 3 sentry in a predictable location are a lot more vulnerable to a level 2 or even a level 1 sentry in a new or more vulnerable, less used spot. My sincere apologies Fanlaen, but I really don't like gun humping- I have to be out in the action constantly building sentries in every conceivable location I can find.

That's what I love about the engineer- if you know how your team is doing and who's building where, his gameplay can be incredibly dynamic and fluid- he's able to take an aggressive stance with his level 1 and 2 sentries if his team's doing well, a defensive stance with a level 3 death machine if the enemy's hammering at the gates, and a supportive/ defensive stance with teleporters and dispensers to give his team the edge in a locked up situation.