Stickey Launcher vs. the grenade launcher

im goin to pick up Demoman this weekend. I was wondering which weapon is better to use. I noticed many people use stickey launcher alot and never use grenades. Is stickey luancher a better weapon? I played demoman when this first came out... does the nades still explode on contact?

If someone can respond....tht would begreat...

They have different purposes imho.

I use regular pipes for crowd control. That is if i see a bunch of guys ill just fire as many as I can into them.
Also if I cant see my enemy but know they will be congregating in an area (think about the long passages in the last section of dustbowl) then ill just keep tossing them down that hallway.

I use remote pipes for protecting an area or making sure the enemy doesn't advance.
Protecting an area like throwing pipes down on a CP
or
making sure the enemy doesn't advance as in ill put pipes down in a group or a line so that if an enemy tries to move up they will get blown up.


Remote pipes are good for doing splash damage to an SG when you cant get a direct hit without getting shot.
regular pipes are good for damaging an sg when you can get a direct hit without getting shot at yourself

remote pipes are good for stopping guys from following you. make a trail behind you as you run away.
regular pipes are good for blowing people up if you are comming from behind them

remote pipes are good for when there is an enemy uber.
Lay em down and then wait for the uber to go out.
alternatively you can lay a bunch down and fire before the uber ends with hopes that you will blast the medic away from his target

Nades used to be able to explode on contact and after the first bounce, but now it's only on contact, and the "clip" size has been reduced to four.

A lot of people underestimate how useful grenades are. The thing is with stickies is they do more damage, have a larger "clip" size, and can gib multiple enemies in quick procession since you can detonate at your leisure.

Honestly? The time to use stickies and grenades are completely situational. Let's take Dustbowl for example:

If you're on the very first CP and soldiers are coming at you from the left side, you can either use A. Stickies to either deny them that route and have to shoot at your from afar (fruitlessly) or take the lower route, which you can also sticky, or get annihilated if you're proficient at placing spontaneously.

BUT, you can also use Grenades to "herd" the enemies away from you. If they have a medic, it's going to take at least three stickies to take out the soldier being healed or to get the splash near the Medic. This setup time is hindering and by the time you have killed them they have probably already taken out a forward Sentry or auxiliary defender. Using grenades works immensely well against Medic teams, I can't tell you how many times I've herded the Medic into the corner of the their shack on that CP (or in numerous other places) and either A. Killed them or B. seperated the Medic from his buddies and making them both vulnerable to the rest of your team. You can also herd teams into strategically places stickies, using both weapons effectively. (The splash from your grenades will hurt the team running the opposite direction and your stickies will kill everyone else).

Grenades are very useful in enclosed areas--once you get decent at aiming them right at the enemy you can normally come out on top with an encounter with an Engineer, Soldier, another Demo, or even a Pyro... Especially Pyros who will run straight at you not suspecting to be shelled to death.

Although you're going to want to learn to use your stickies. Sometimes there are open areas where you have no other option. If a scout is harassing you, surround their dancing area with stickies as they try to pelt you, and detonate when you've made a rough estimate of where they are compared to your placement. I've killed many a lone scout in this fashion, same goes for Engies, lone Medics, snipers, spies who run out of cloak (my personal favorite) and yes, even Soldiers.

Heavies are a problem. A very big problem. They can eat three of your grenades and still mow you down. What do you do? Get away. If you catch him revving up his minigun, it's not too hard to land two or three grenades on him and then retreat behind a corner--lay some stickies down quick! If the Heavy doesn't get to you first it'll probably be a faster class tagging alongside with him and his Medic. They're just fodder.

I hope this helps a little. The main thing to realize if that in order to use the Demo to his fullest extent, you need to utilize both Grenade and Stickies when their respective situations call for it. It really matters on what will do the most damage to the enemy the fastest, or what has the best chance of keeping you alive.

I forgot to mention this: Be aware of where your stickies are. In the heat of battle on the front, a lot of times Demos will end up killing themselves after firing stickies in every direction and detonating without getting themselves out of range of the blast. It happens. All. The. Time.

Please also note that you can detonate stickies while they are still in the air.  This is especially useful when defending the last cap on Dustbowel, as you can throw stickies to blow up soldiers who are using the "Peek-Fire" tactic.  Nothing says "BACK OFF" like a sticky going off right next to you.

usually i use the gernade launcher thing for close range and so, but in places like 2fort's sewers, i susally just place stickies on top of my teams tunnel where it is hard to see and place a lot of those charged stickies. WHen somebody comes i just explode and if anyone is remaining, i just use the gernae launcher or bottle to finish em up.

Really you just have to play and learn the best weapon for the job at hand. They both have strengths and weaknesses and knowing when and how to use both is the most effective strategy.
I rarely leave stickies undetonated for long. The same spot doesn't work too well multiple times unless you have a good funnel and a safe spot to camp. You can lay a trap and use pipe bombs til someone falls into it which works pretty well or you can lay a base of pipe bombs and shoot stickies for accuracy while the splash whittles them down from the timed detonation.
Don't just rely on one big mess of bombs. Most good players are too smart to fall for that and the stickies don't exactly blend too well into most architecture.
Also practice the timing between release and detonation. There is about 1 second of dead time between the two and knowing that can save you.
Pyros will be a big challenge to get over when you get caught without a trap set. You need to know how to back off and kill them and also when to just eat the flame and go for the bottle.
If you get caught reloading and people are charging you, don't be afraid to go bottle and swing like a drunken scottish cyclops. I get a good amount of bottle kills just by saying screw it and trying to damage rather than waiting for my guns to reload.
Always reload when you have a chance. Yo ucan detonate stickies from either gun and I believe the bottle as well so if one is empty and you have a second reload it.
You will kill yourself while learning and even after. Don't worry.