Sunday Morning
So I sat here not particularly looking forward to a 7.5 hr shift in 45 minutes time, relaxing with a nice game of TF2. Up pops a contract, which I promptly accept and find to be a simple Demoman “kills, melee kills, kills capping objective.” Easy, i thought to myself, and i can get a nice item for my troubles.
On i hop to a quickplay server, with the valve gods serving me up a well populated Powerhouse. Now i will qualify this with one thing, i despise the new Gun Mettle maps, all of them. Suijin is a mess with awful height abuse and just all round terrible map design (BUT PRAWN ITS PRETTY), Powerhouse lasts forever far too often for my liking and Snowplow is just so “meh” it makes me wonder why anyone gave a shit it wasn't introduced earlier.
Equip time, i go for standard Grenade Launcher for the no doubt endless sentries im about to face on their last point, with the Tide Turner and Eyelander to bag those juicy melee kills. What followed was 20 minutes of tedious nonsense trying to cap their last, not a great start, but hey i got 40 CP so i just accepted it and on we moved to Snowplow.
Quack.
It was about this time that a double unusual wearing Soldier with some clear experience joined the server. Great, i thought, a good challenge for me to hit some air pipes, and for a while that was the case. As my CP steadily rose i was enjoying myself more than i had in a pub for a looong time. However, it was when my team won a round that this fella revealed his true stripes. Immediately he starts raging, cussing out his team and demanding they do this or that. Now, i generally find it really hard to hold my tongue against jerks like this but for now i let him be, im sure he will calm down i thought. But no, he continued with his tirade of nonsense and eventually i just hit him with the calm and i thought helpful “you would have a lot more fun if you took this less seriously im sure.” Of course, this isn’t true for everyone but i felt in this moment he just needed to take a step back and realise his ridiculousness. His response? “suck a twat.” Gave me a right chuckle and i left it at that, he clearly wasn’t worth it. But that brings me to my whole point. What and who are pubs really for in TF2?
It’s a question that is constantly debated over on reddit, with frustrated newer players angry at unusual wearing comp players storming their hang out and those players bemoaning the hate they receive for just playing their favourite game. Personally, as someone with way too much play time, i would obviously side with the latter. I enjoy pubs and sometimes it is hard to hold back when you have a contract to grind out or just want to let off some steam (lel). It is true that playing against better players is a great way to improve, but honestly i think it’s weak reasoning when the opponents are sometimes helpless just due to the nature of Team Fortress and it’s game modes and classes. Therefore i would argue simply that ANY player should be able to play a pub however he likes as long as he treats people with respect and does not get angry at people’s lack of experience or strange play. The fella i met today clearly falls outside of this and it makes me sad people like this will continue to cause friction between the various skill levels in Pubs and generally cause a toxic atmosphere on many servers.
So, the bit you have obviously all been waiting for. Advanced contract done with cheap melee kills and i get this:
Joy.
