Hello all. The scout is a standard part of most MvM teams. He is also subject to a huge meta. I don't mean that every team must have a scout in order to succeed, because quite a few people know that a good spy can replace a scout ...and that pyro, medic, sniper and demoknight can be suitable replacements for the scout in later waves and still net you an A rank if the team contributes.

I mean instead that if you play scout....everyone states that you MUST only use certain weapons and that you MUST only buy certain upgrades. There is no room for variation. In that way, scout is one of the most meta'd class.

Not only is it boring...it's a bit of a neutered class slot. You don't have to play the meta scout, YOU CAN BE SO MUCH MORE...IF YOU JUST BELIEVE

Anyways, I'll start from the basics and work my way up. Take notes

A few terms or facts that I'll explain here:


Damage Per Second (DPS) - Normally there's isn't actually a number attached to this. It's used as a term to say "Damage Output" where you explain damage output of X relative to damage output of Y. Such as Phlog Pyro has a higher DPS than your syringe gun battle medic.

Aggro - A term for drawing an enemy's attention. Basically it's a term used to say "the bots are currently targeting you". There are certain mechanics to a bot's aggro that you learn over time with experience.

Movement Speed Cap - The fastest you can 'Run' is 520 Hammer Units / Second (Hu/s). This is the cap....once you've reached it, you can't go faster. A charging demoknight can go up to 750 Hu/S and an explosion jump (rocket jump/sticky jump) can get you much faster. For the case of the Scout you will run at a top speed of 520 Hu/s

Damage Ramp-up and Fall-off - The damage that a weapon does depends on your distance from your target. The wiki explains more about it https://wiki.teamfortress.com/wiki/Damage. A quick summation: If you're a heavy, scout, or a soldier you will do much more damage by moving in close.

Base Health: 125 HP
Base Speed: 133% Speed (400 Hammer Units / Second)

So you can see that the Scout has the lowest health but the fastest movement speed.


In competitive the scout is either flanking, watching the flanks, or moving in to clean up kills. He's mobile and his scattergun can deal tons of damage at close range. Plus there's class limits and you can't just have 5 demoman and soldiers

In MvM, his roll is usually a little different.

- In MvM, there are large waves of enemies....much more than in PvP. Therefore, the main damage dealing is normally left up to classes who can constantly damage multiple bots (soldier, demo, pyro, heavy, sniper) with the engineer's sentry supporting. Since the Scout does damage in large bursts to single targets he isn't normally used for his offensive capability. Instead he's used for his mobility advantage and specialized by focusing on certain upgrades.

- MvM consists of multiple waves of robot hordes. The waves get progressively harder (most times anyway). In order to keep up with the progressing difficulty of the waves, you need to buy upgrades for your character throughout the mission. Bots drop cash when they are killed that needs to be collected. This cash is used to buy your upgrades. This is where the scout's role comes into play. Since scout is the most mobile class he is ideal for collecting the credits. Not only this, he was given a special ability in MvM - the money magnet. The scout has a magnetizing aura around him that draws cash towards him.

- The scout is mobile and has a money tractor beam. This is why he is the best at collecting cash...because it's easy for him to do so. Collecting cash is your #1 role. The scout has other attributes that he excels at and has other uses to the team, but collecting cash is your primary role. With that said....collecting 100% of the cash SHOULD NOT be the most important thing to you. It's merely a goal that you should strive for. Collecting cash is the main role of the scout, but it does not trump everything. Winning the wave is still the most important part of MvM. If you've collected the majority of the money - GOOD ENOUGH! Don't ever let some idiot tell you otherwise

The primary weapon is not the biggest concern for most scouts since they never use it. I won't try to convince you that you should use 1 and only 1 loadout and that said loadout is superior to everything else in all situations. That's how dumb meta players think.

Here is a list of all of the scout's primaries and their stats


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Scattergun

Clip Size: 6
Ammo Capacity: 32

The scattergun has a base damage of 60. This is 100% of the damage, all pellets hitting. All scattergun have a ramp up of 175% of the base damage. A point blank meatshot will deal 105 damage.

It has a clip of 6 bullets. This weapon is a solid choice for dealing bursts of damage. You do not always need a constant stream of damage unless you're fighting against a full health Giant or a Tank. Sometimes a burst of damage is all you need for the current situation. Unloading the clip without any upgrades and at pointblank range will be 630 damage. That's a pretty decent amount. However, the downside of this weapon is that it reloads each bullet individually instead of the whole clip at once like some of the other scout primaries. Over time, other primaries will be able to deal more damage because their firing speeds and/or their reload speeds are faster

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Soda Popper - WINNER 2015 BEST IN CLASS

Clip Size: 2
Ammo Capacity: 32

The soda popper has the same damage stats as the stock scattergun (60 base damage), but only has a clipsize of 2. However, it fires 50% faster and reloads 25% faster than the stock scattergun. It also reloads it's entire clip in 1 animation. Over time, this weapon will outdamage all weapons but the Shortstop.

It also has a 'Hype' meter that is built by running or jumping for a total of 13 seconds. If you activate 'Hype' when the meter is full, you will be blessed with the ability to do 5 additional air jumps until the meter runs out 8 seconds later.

This weapon is also cheap to upgrade. There are no firing speed upgrades or reload speed upgrades to buy to increase it's DPS. Only damage and clip size

This is my preferred weapon of choice. The hype ability gives the scout some impressive dodging ability. The ability to do 5 extra additional air jumps means that you can change both your level and direction at a tap of the jump button. You will be able to dodge a whole lot of projectiles because of this. This also means that you don't need to even upgrade jump height if you don't want to. The weapon also has great DPS. It is relatively cheap to upgrade to it's DPS ceiling (1600 in Damage. 1600 in Clip Size). Although the Shortstop has a higher DPS potential, it's expensive. This weapon does excellent damage through all waves. The difference between Shortstop and Soda Popper's dps isn't even that much anyway

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Force A Nature

Clip Size: 2
Ammo Capacity: 32

This weapon is similar to the Soda Popper. It has 50% faster firing speed, but instead has 20% more pellets per shot. Basically that means the base damage is 65 and full ramp up is 114. But it doesn't have the 25% faster reload that the Soda Popper has. Over time, the Soda Popper has more DPS than this.

The weapon has a knockback effect (both to the user and the target). Most players will use the self-knockback to perform a "triple-jump" by firing towards the ground to get a slight hop upwards. This can be great for the dodging ability of the scout. It took me a little while to get used to it, but it is a great attribute to this weapon.

The target knockback can be both a positive and a negative. It is a positive when used to reset the bomb over a pit,cliff, or bridge. It is also a positive when used to delay a Super Scout since the shot will pop the Super Scout into the air, essentially stopping it in its track for the duration. However, the negative is that these sudden changes in a bot's position can impact your teammate's aim and make them miss. It's the same negative that makes airblasts pyros so overrated. On some teams the negative outweighs the positives so it's better that you use another primary

Overall, it's a decent choice for a primary

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Shortstop

Clip Size: 4
Ammo Capacity: 36

This weapon is like a beefier pistol. It draws from the same ammo pool as your secondary if you have a pistol-type weapon equipped.

It fires 42% faster and reloads the entire clip in 1 animation. It has 60% less pellets, but each pellet does double damage. The result is a 20% drop in the base damage down to 42. Unlike the scatterguns, the Shortstop can only benefit from 150% damage ramp up and a pointblank meatshot will deal 72.

It sounds like a nerfed version of the default Scattergun. 2 less in the clip, less damage..why would I use this? Well, the 42% faster firing speed and clip-based reload make up for it and as you get a larger clip size, the clip-based reload becomes even more of a benefit. Even though it already has 42% faster firing speed, it can still utilize the "Firing Speed" upgrade, unlike the Soda Popper and Force A Nature. Fully upgraded, this weapon has the highest DPS...but it is expensive to do so. This is more of a later wave kind of weapon.

The Shortstop has smaller bullet spread than the scatterguns. At mid ranges, this will deal more consistant damage than the scattergun primaries. It's good over a larger span of ranges whereas scatterguns are reliant on getting in close range.

The Shortstop, while deployed, grants +20% from all healing sources. This does include health from cash piles (discussed later). It also has a passive effect of causing a 40% increase in push force taken. When trying to run in for cash against knockback...this is a downside. When using push force to escape...this is an upside.

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Back Scatter

Clip Size: 4
Ammo Capacity: 32

This weapon deals minicrits when firing at backs and at close range within 500 Hammer Units. It can't deal random crits and has a +20% bullet spread.

Basically this weapon is meant to be used close quarters while flanking someone. Free minicrits is nice, but to be honest most small bots will die just fine without the minicrits and when it's a Giant, you can always just mark it with the Fan O' War or just use Crit-A-Cola. This also nerfs you against the tank. I don't like it.

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Baby Face's Blaster

Clip size: 4
Ammo Capacity: 32

Like the Back Scatter, it's a nerfed scattergun. The only upside is that it increases your movement speed as you deal damage so that you can reach the 520 Hu/s movement speed cap without buying any movement speed upgrades. But I'll just put 600 credits into movement speed and use my Soda Popper...thanks, though. Also I jump quite a bit to dodge projectiles..so this weapon is lame.

To be honest, I don't know for certain if fully upgraded Shortstop does more DPS than fully upgraded Soda Popper. The difference seems to be pretty negligible anyway

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UPDATE:
Here's a quick theoretical analysis of Scattergun vs Soda Popper

http://psteamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=426430122

Read the description

Some more analysis:
http://psteamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/app/440/discussions/1/618459405712298364/

I don't really want to list all of the secondaries, so I'll just talk about the ones that matter



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Mad Milk - WINNER 2015 BEST IN CLASS

Throw this jar of white substance on enemies to cover them in Milk.

Any damage done to a milked target restores 60% of the damage done to the attacking players health.

You don't constantly use your secondary, so might as well use it as a utility. This is why normal scouts don't use a pistol-type. The upside of Mad Milk is quite.....beneficial. Milking robots, especially giant robots, can mean the difference between a teammate surviving and a teammate dying.

Mad Milk is a little overpowered to be honest. It's so overpowered that I can out-survive most of the team as a Battle Medic with Mad Milk syringes. But that's another story entirely.

It's used by 99% of MvM scouts that have any clue of what they're doing. It is part of the scout meta afterall.

Mad Milk is extra beneficial to the team when playing Operation Gear Grinder (Expert). Gear Grinder missions aren't normally played with medic or soldiers on the team (yeah META!!) so Mad Milk is one of the ways teammates outlast a beefy Giant that appears. Gear Grinder also shafts you by giving you only few credits to upgrade with. This means that most of the times players don't have maxed out resistances and double points of Health On Kill, etc. A lot of times the heavies (who will be taking most of the aggro) are waiting for a Giant to get milked before trying to fully tank against it. The absence of Mad Milk is felt much more in Gear Grinder

But it isn't the only secondary you can use

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Crit-A-Cola

This drink, when used, causes all damage dealt to be mini-critted and all damage taken will be increased by +10%. It also increases Movement speed +25% while under the effect. The effect lasts 8 seconds and has a 24 second recharge time.

Minicrits are quite spectacular. Not only does it multiply your damage by 1.35, it also removes damage fall-off and stacks with ramp up. This means that a pointblank meatshot of the scattergun would now do 142 instead of 105. If you're at mid-to-long range, it forces that damage to the base damage and then multiplies it by 1.35. Bullet spread is still in effect, though...so if you only hit 8 of the 10 pellets, then you'll do 48 x 1.35 = 65 Damage.

The +10% extra damage isn't that much to be honest....especially if you dodge most of it. 110% of 0 damage is 0 damage (MATH!). It's almost a negligible downside...almost.

The +25% Movement speed can be nice for the 1st wave I suppose. Once you get max movement speed upgrades...you've already reached the ground movement speed cap of 520 Hu/s and this +25% movement speed effect won't increase it any further

Using this, you're trading off your assist role for more raw DPS. It is great for tank-busting and also later waves when teammates have resistances built and the team damage output is high that bots die really quickly. Lets say you've maxed out upgrades on your scattergun. Your clip size is 18. Your Damage per meatshot is 210.

Under the effects of Crit-A-Cola
1.35(210) x 18 = 5103 Damage

Look at that, you just killed a Giant with your clip. Realistically you're not going to hit every shot as a meatshot, but even at mid range provided that each pellet hits

1.35(120) x 18 = 2916 Damage

Your realistic damage is somewhere in between there.

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Bonk! Atomic Punch

When used, the user is immune to all damage but is unable to attack. Knockback still affects the player. The effect lasts for 8 seconds and has a 24 second recharge time.

Really, this is only used to make a cash dash when you're unsure if you can survive the trip. Normally, people use this on Wave 1 of Hamlet Hostility. Lame crutch - you don't need it :)
Sometimes people use it when they die. They're going to respawn, have no overheal, and usually rush in to collect cash. Since the scout is fragile, this may be an acceptable time to use this

In theory, if you were to fully upgrade it and use it exclusively along with some resistances....you could be the ultimate aggro dump. Just draw all aggro towards yourself and away from your teammates at all times and collect money as well. It could have niche wave uses (I'm thinking the expert waves with Giant Medics in them), but other than that....there is just a much more efficient way to play scout.

I'm already tired of this section. The useful ones are somewhere in this screenshot



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Fan O' War - WINNER 2015 BEST IN CLASS

The Fan O' War is the meta weapon...but for good reason. When you hit an enemy with it, it 'marks them for death'. All damage done to that enemy will be mini-crits. NOTE: YOU CAN ONLY MARK 1 ENEMY FOR DEATH AT A TIME! If you hit another enemy with the Fan while the current marked one is still alive, the 'Mark for Death' will switch over to the one you just hit.

Marking a giant for death is a big help to killing it. When a Giant is both milk and marked, you've debuffed that giant to a point where your damage dealing classes are no longer afraid of it for the most part. Unless that Giant can do insane amounts of burst damage (RAPID FIRE CRITS)

TIP: When you're waiting for a Demoman to explode a group of stickies to eliminate uber medics attached to a Giant it's best to try to Mark the Giant before the stickies are detonated. That way, the damage of the sticky trap will be multiplied by 1.35. I see some scouts wait until the uber medics are dead to take any action. Nah....go for the mark immediately if you can. The Milk you will want to hold out on until the detonation. A medic's heal beam can remove the milk effect on their target.

The team does have other sources of mini-crits. A soldier's buff banner or a medic's Kritzkrieg can add crit effects. Sometimes, Giants die so fast that marking it makes little difference. Other times, the damage increased by marking a Giant is actually just damage you could have done by just firing your primary at the Giant instead.

Let's say your team does 2000 damage to the Giant during the mark and they weren't suffering from damage fall off. If the Giant is marked they would have done 2000 x 1.35 = 2700 Damage. They did 700 extra damage during that time. In the time it took you milk and mark the Giant and then switch weapons...you probably could have gotten 4 meatshots off. Maxed out damage that's 840 Damage. If you were using Crit-A-Cola then 1134 Damage

I'm just making up numbers, but the point is that sometimes just firing is better and Fan O' War is good, but you don't always get the full effect out of it.

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Sandman

You can spend 500 credits to upgrade the Sandman to have the 'Mark on Hit' effect. The benefit is that you can Mouse2 and send a baseball that marks whatever it hits as well. It can work, I never use it though.

Sometimes I carry this for Wave 1 of Bone Shaker when there are no Giants and then switch later on. I like stunning things with the ball

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Candy Cane

Using this adds a +25% explosive vulnerability, but when you kill a bot (with any weapon) they will drop a small health pack.

It's fine if you're not too worried about dying with it. The small health packs is a pretty negligible upside though and Fan O' War is superior in most cases.

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Everything said...I never care too much about what loadout a Scout is using. Sure, there are horrible loadouts, but the skill and playstyle of the scout is more important. I do usually feel the absence of Mad Milk though especially in Gear Grinder

I'll have 2 builds: Support Scout for those newer to playing Scout in MvM and Damage Scout for those more experienced



Top Priorities:
Movement Speed
1 or 2 Jump Height if you need it
Resistances according to wave
Milk Slow and Recharge

Explanation:

Movement speed is important for the scout. It allows you to dodge a lot of damage that you may otherwise not have been able to. That's not to say that you definitely will die a lot without it. You can do just fine without movement speed upgrades, but usually you're better off upgrading it.

Jump Height can help with dodging sometimes. The level change can help against the robots aimbot tracking. I don't really need it (with my Soda Popper) so I rarely touch it until the later waves. However, if you're still new and learning scout jump height can help you.

With this build, you're playing mostly support. Your point is to milk and mark as much as you can. Most of the times I find it to be milk overkill, but sometimes it isn't. The resistances is to help you stay alive as a newer scout. You aren't familiar with dodging, aggro manipulation, or using the maps cover properly. You'll probably take a lot of unecessary damage that more experienced scouts can avoid.

Also, as a new scout, your hitscan aim at such speeds is lacking. You'll most likely miss a lot of enemies you try to aim at. Instead we're going to have you focus on doing tasks that don't require much aim. The Mad milk has an Area of Effect and hitting a Giant with the Fan O' War is easy


Top Priorities:
Movement Speed
Crit Resistance if appropriate
Increasing your DPS for your primary
Milk slow and 1-2 Recharge if necessary ... provided you're using Mad Milk

Explanation:

Again movement speed is important. I skip Jump Height upgrades because I don't notice a real difference in survivability with them. I'll get them in Manhattan or Decoy when the upgrades help you easily access the top areas.

Crit Damage is a little too much and at 150 per upgrade, crit resistance is relatively cheap for such a benefit. It depends on if there are dangerous crit bots in the wave or not. Crit bat scouts don't count.

An experienced scout does not need maxed out resistances. They are usually good enough to dodge most everything. However, nobody is perfect and anyone can get caught and die. The good thing is that scouts respawn after a 2 second timer. It's not such a big thing if you die as scout, just respawn, jump on the teleporter and get back into the action. This is why ignoring resistances as scout isn't so detrimental...especially if you're experienced.

You don't need to ignore resistances while trying Damage Scout. Buy what you feel comfortable with, but the trick is to make savings wherever you can so you can finance your primary upgrades. Find a balance

Mad Milk is still nice, but usually you don't need more than 2 recharge upgrades to have it when you need it. The spacing between Giants is sometimes long and having max recharge means that you have long periods where you're not using the milk even if it is ready. This depends on the wave, but for the most part I think 2 points in milk recharge is good enough.

Instead, you're mostly playing as if you were just another damage class...except you have an added benefit that picking up cash heals you (more later)

Most people don't understand just how much damage a scout's primary can do. It's harder to aim, does single target damage, and they believe scout needs to invest in only resistances and mad milk. It's easier to just tell the scout....hey just do this simple task of throwing this milk bomb at the enemy. The skill floor is relatively low

A damage scout affords upgrades into his primary by making savings in other areas. For me this includes Bullet and Blast Resistance (1800 credits), Jump Height (300 credits), and the last 2 points of Mad Milk recharge (500 credits). That's 2600 credits. To upgrade my Soda Popper to it's DPS ceiling I need 3200 credits. Others don't even use Mad Milk or leave it unupgraded (another 700 credits).

Upgrading your primary DPS:

For the primaries that aren't Soda Popper and Force A Nature, the best way to increase sustained DPS is first Reload Speed and then Firing Speed. After that you can get Clip Size and Damage. However, you don't always need sustained. Reload speed isn't as important when you only need short bursts of damage followed by moments of free time to reload.

For Soda Popper/FaN, the best way to upgrade is 2 clip size, 4 damage, then 2 clip size. This is the best DPS upgrade path.
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For me, I upgrade 1 clip size and then max out damage. I like having the damage to burst an enemy dead in 1 shot. I find that I can't always hit every shot against bots, so doing more damage per shot that I do hit is good. Also, it helps the ammo last longer this way.
It's up to you really.

Also lets say you had to be an uber medic picker. To do this reliably, you need to be able to kill the medic in 1 shot (Do more than 150 damage at once).

If you have 1 upgrade in Damage, you can first mark the medic for death, then go for a meatshot

1.25(105) x 1.35 = 177

or if you have 2 upgrades in Damage, you can meatshot the medic without marking it

1.50(105) = 157

Again - Damage Scout should only be used by experienced players. It requires good MvM gamesense...that only comes with experience.

HOLD YOUR RAGE UNTIL THE END, PLEASE

The scout's main role on the team is that he is the best at collecting cash. He was given a money magnet specifically for accomplishing this role. He's fast, very mobile, and money is attracted to him.

When a scout collects money, he gains health from said cash pile. IT DOES NOT MATTER HOW MUCH EACH PILE IS WORTH. All that matters is that 1 pile is worth a certain amount of health to the scout.

So how exactly does the cash health mechanic work? For that we'll have to turn to our scientist and master of Empirical Data, sigsegv

Source Thread:
http://psteamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/app/440/discussions/1/617328415073758431/

Chart:
http://psteamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=397981184

Summary: The amount of health that a cash pile provides is based off of the current health of the scout.

Not using Sandman nor Pretty Boy's Bocket Pistol:
0-125 Health [0-100% of base health]: Each Pile gives 50 Health
125-500 Health [100%-400% of base health]: Each Pile gives 25 Health
After that it starts getting less and less until each cash pile gives a minimum of 5 health

Notice that the mechanic is affected by the base health of the scout. The Sandman lowers your base health, the Pretty Boy's Pocket Pistol raises your base health. Most likely you won't be using either of those.

When you're using the Shortstop, the health from each cash pile gives an additional 20%. This is the complete chart accounting for that loadout.

http://psteamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=398995396

Charts are pretty right?

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So as a scout it's beneficial for you to collect the money because it gives you health...lots of health. And there is currently no cap on the amount of health you can build up to by constantly collecting cash. Although realistically, you probably won't ever see your health over 900, especially since your overheal is decaying just about as fast as you can pick up those piles that only give you 5 HP.

As a fragile little scout, how should you start waves when you have no overheal?

Simple, either stay behind cover or make sure not to draw aggro towards yourself until some bots die and drop cash piles.

The new scouts that aren't experienced usually stand out in the open. They're not good at dodging and they die shortly after the wave starts. They die, respawn, teleport back and then wrecklessly rush towards the cash on the ground. Since they have no overheal they're likely to die again.

It is a vicious cycle that could have been avoided if only the scout would have been patient in the beginning and waited for some cash to drop before rushing in. This way he can build up an overheal and then staying alive becomes easier.


http://psteamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=413952220

You see at the bottom-left part of your HUD there is a yellow box with a Green-Font "$5" in it. That's your indicator that shows how much cash is currently lying on the ground. Scouts use that to know if they've collected all of the cash currently on the ground or if there is some cash pile somewhere still on the map.

While the font is still GREEN, you have collected all of cash. Once the font goes to BLACK, it means you have missed some pile of cash. It has already burned up. When cash drops, it will burn up after 30 seconds and can't be collected after that. If you collect all of the cash by the end of the wave and receive an A+ ranking, then your team will be awarded with a 100 credit bonus. The bonus money is nice, but isn't a game changer. No mission ever depends on you getting an A+ ranking in order to beat it. In fact, most missions provide you with more than enough cash to complete it without any problems. Gear grinder is infamous for stiffing you on credits, especially MannSlaughter. Only on Mannslaughter is collecting a lot of cash very benificial. However, good teams can still get by Mannslaughter with lower credit rankings.

I've played plenty of Bone Shaker missions where I'm a cash collecting grenadeknight demo. We don't have a scout and still get A, B, sometimes C rankings and still get by just fine.

You'll find that there are a lot of idiots that lose their minds when a little bit of cash is missed "OMG SCOUT, YOU MISSED $5!!" Ignore them. They suck at MvM. Maybe not suck, but mediocre at best (I'm sure that pissed off a lot of you idiots. Come at me, bro)

Priority #1 is winning the wave with a majority of the cash collected. The end

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Ok, so individual class priority is collect the majority of the cash. Aim for getting an A+, but never go searching for some hidden $5 when there are other roles you need to be fulfilling at the time, such as milking and/or marking a high priority target or contributing DPS to the tank if it's close to the hatch. Too many people judge the performance of a scout based almost entirely on what credit ranking they get. This is horrible...absolutely. I always chuckle when someone starts going over chat, "DAMN IT SCOUT, YOU MISSED MONEY!" Then I press Tab and check the scoreboard stats and I see just how horribly they themselves are doing. "Hey man, maybe if you weren't such a bad soldier the waves would go much smoother and an A+ would be easier to achieve"

Mad Milk can be upgraded with slow effect that slows the target down to 35% of whatever their classes base speed. I know the upgrade says -35% of movement speed, so you would expect bots to go to 65% speed, but it turns out that Valve isn't very good at coding.

Source Thread (courtesy of sigsegv):
http://psteamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/app/440/discussions/1/617328967242871555/#c617328967248380122

A Super Scout is coded to run at 800 Hu/s. However, he's hard capped at 520 Hu/s. When you throw mad Milk on him, it ignores the "2x speed" coding and instead slows him down to 35% of a scout's base speed. This is 0.35(400) = 140 Hu/s

This is why every class can outrun a milked Super Scout even when they shouldn't be able to. If it were coded correctly the milked Super Scout would still run at 338 Hu/S, which is faster than all classes without upgrades except for your own Scout.

Oh yeah, where was I...Priorities. Milk Super Scouts if your team is unreliable to kill them / bodyblock them without them being slowed. Super Scouts wreck havoc on bad teams. After all is said and done, the mad milk reduces the Super Scout to 27% of the speed he was running at.

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Milk and Mark priority targets in order to assist your team

MvM waves aren't consistent throughout. Sometimes, it's just lulls in action where they throw 1 scout bot at you or constant groups of soldiers. Other times, it throws numerous support, engie bots, and Giant Medic + Giant Demo combos all at once. These intense times with high priority targets are when Milk and Marking is most needed.

10 Giant Black Box soldiers coming up? Prep up your milk and marking, it's time for you to earn your keep.

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The other priority is DON'T BE USELESS WHEN YOU'RE NOT COLLECTING CASH OR MILK/MARKING. Fire your weapon! Go for point blank shots to maximize damage.

In Short: Collect Money, Support your team, Save the waves from imminent danger, Do Damage

Alright lets talk about actual gameplay tips to help you become a better scout


Your mobility is your best asset as a scout. Once you stop moving, you become an easy target. If you're going Damage Scout and not upgrading resistances this can lead to a quick death. Also, change direction constantly. You're most likely to dodge this way. The reason that the Soda Popper's 'Hype' is so awesome is that I can change direction and level instantaneous and most projectile's have little chance of hitting me during the jumps.

EDIT: Along these lines is circle strafing bots, especially Giants. With the movement speed of a scout, you can circle strafe Giants and their aimbot tracking has a hard time adjusting - you're changing angle on them much too fast. A Giant Heavy looks like he's malfunctioning when he tries to keep up with your circle-strafing. (kudos for the reminder, CAR_)


When you're going in to collect money, most of the time it's unavoidable that you will draw aggro. Take the "sneaky" path to get up to the front line. Don't just run straight from Point A to Point B with a horde of bots in the way. That's a good way to take a lot of unecessary damage. Cut angles from the bots. Stay behind cover, hop out into the open to grab cash, hop behind cover again if you've drawn a lot of bot aggro. It's mainly a game of hopping in and out of cover and being an annoying pest


You don't score any points for this. It's something sports analyst always call "the intangibles". There's no scoreboard stat that shows "Oh this scout is drawing all of the aggro away from his teammates and dodging".

As you improve you'll notice that you are really good at dodging certain bots...essentially anything that isn't hitscan.

Why let bots shoot at your teammates when you can dodge their fire easily? The trick is that you don't want to hide. Don't duck behind cover and don't move to a such a distance that you'll drop aggro. Stay at a safe range, dodge, and let your teammates have some fun firing at neutered bots.


Sometimes my aim is horribly off. Sometimes I'm in the zone.

I wish I had a recording of me maintaining the aggro of the 3 Giant Banner Soldiers of Wave 2 Bavarian Botbash. I had their aggro 80% of the time and their firing rate is too slow that you can dodge every single projectile. The heavy just point blanked the three of them for an easy win.


Get used to aiming as a scout especially at increased movement speeds. The reason that people are hesitant when scouts upgrade damage on their primary is because their past experiences tell them that such a scout is going to suck. Most noobs scouts who do upgrade this way usually are completely clueless about their ability to collect cash, constantly die, and yet their damage output is still horrible because they can't aim. It's the exact same reasoning why people don't want Sniper, Spies, Pyros, and (in some circles) Medic on their team. Noobs tarnish the class.

You don't need to have the scout abilities of Clockwork and Cyzer to be successful with Damage Scout. But you need to be at least decent with your aim.


When cash drops, you have 30 seconds to collect it before it burns up. That's actually quite a lot of time. Do not always rush straight for the cash immediately when you see money has dropped. In some cases there are just TOO many bots surrounding the cash. Wait a few seconds...bots will start to move. You may find that after a few seconds there's now a clearer path to the cash. I've found that to be the case in many occassions when I'm almost positive that there's no way I could get to that cash....10 seconds later...."Oh, ok, now's a good chance to get that pile"

My opinion is that Damage Scout is what every MvM scout should aspire to be. It's the most efficient way to play the class. It's like how a Soldier who properly learns how to use the Beggar's Bazooka would be the the final progression point for MvM Soldiers.

Myself personally, I keep the Milk and Fan. I support the team as much as necessary and make savings in the usual 'meta' upgrade path of the Scout because I'm betting that I can still survive and do well without all of those resistances and jump height. The fact that I can become another Damage class is a great benefit

* In all missions where tanks are a problem having a reliable tank-busting scout to help contribute damage is always great. I've played enough games where I have highest tank damage and still get at least A's despite some teammate saying "Scout, you have to stay in the front and collect cash"

* Whenever I find myself near a Giant in the frontlines, I can quickly chip away ~800 Health with my Soda Popper Clip while I'm in the process of collecting cash. The damage is just helpful.

* Scout isn't some crowd-control god. I don't claim to have that ability. Where I really contribute is against Giants and against Tanks....but I can hold down the bomb pretty well at times.

* Having increased damage actually allows me to be pretty decent at breaking through a mecha engie bot nest. With the damage upgrades you can bumrush the bot sentry and burst it dead faster than the mecha engie can repair it.

* Damage Scout can become another class that can take care of Giant Medics if need be. The trick to killing a Giant Medic is to not allow the Medic to get under 50 HP unless it's a killing blow. Once under that amount, the Quickfix will pop and the Giant Medic regenerates to full health instantly. The most reliable classes to killing Giant Medics are those with huge burst damage. Fully upgraded scatterguns will do 284 to a marked Giant Medic per meatshot. If you're unlucky and the Giant Medic was at 285-334 HP when you hit the first shot, then it'll pop....otherwise there'a good chance you can kill it

Well, the easiest way to test damage output is to see how fast a class can kill a tank. It's not a fair test for the Sniper, Spy, and Heavy though. Sniper and Spy cannot use their crit mechanic (headshot, backstab) on the tank and the tank nerfs the Heavy's minigun -75%. Otherwise it's a good way to compare damage output.

Let's check youtube for various tests:

This video was made when Soda Popper still gave 'mini-crits' instead of 'hype'. That's outdated. Also.....EAR RAPE!


Infinite ammo and seems to be a little bit beefier tank. I think over time the random crits mechanic of the Shortstop is making the difference to put it in the lead.


Infinite ammo and a 25k Tank. Beggar's Soldier has the buff banner to himself and wins, especialy since he loaded a barrage in preparation for the "tank appearing". In this particular trial, the soda popper beat out the Shortstop. I think with more trials, the 'random crits' mechanic of Shortstop will make the difference and put it in the lead. Also you'd see the difference over a longer time period, such as a 40k Tank.


This is with infinite ammo and buff banner going up. The Shortstop firing speed takes advantage of the duration of the buff banner the best and wins out.

----
There is some variance there. But Shortstop and Soda Popper scout keeping up with Beggar's soldier and Phlog pyro? Like whoa

Scout is a very important class on most teams. He is the main cash collector and for most meta scouts, he debuffs priority targets and draws a lot of fire away from his teammates, but never shoots. This is a perfectly acceptable playstyle. Most missions don't REQUIRE an additional damage class. The meta does just fine.

However, being able to serve as another damage class, most notably on the tank, is always helpful to struggling teams. Even in expert where the meta runs 2 heavies, who are nerfed -75% against the tank, a tank-busting scout is a big help. As long as you're not letting your desire to do damage override your role to collect cash you will be fine. I find Mad Milk + Fan to be the best loadout to run, but other loadouts mentioned can serve a team just fine.

Treat bots like a pinata. You have to kill it in order to get that awesome health pack inside (aka cash)
_______

A few screenshots:
Damage varies based on how much slack I have to pick up

This dickwad soldier says after Wave 1 "Scout, you're terrible. You missed $5. You need to collect money, not shoot". So I told him soon after "I am going to outscore you, noob"









And here I switched to demo only for the last wave

In case your eyes aren't bleeding already from reading this half-novel, I'll suggest some further reading. My motivation wavered during some sections and I rushed through it and might have missed some things. There is some good information to be gained from reading other guides that provide a different perspective.

Detailed Money Scout:
http://psteamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=232526215

Old but still decent. Detailed. First guide I read on scout when I was starting out. Came out 3 days before I started MvM
http://psteamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=150296100

Quick and Simple:
http://psteamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=326070370

Sky Night got his guide out while mine was sitting idle waiting to be finished:
http://psteamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=411381005

http://psteamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=368625029
http://psteamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=350852781



Thanks for reading. Have a good one

If you have some negative comments, please share it. However, I AM going to look at your TF2 hours, tours completed, and bots killed provided your profile isn't private. Don't embarrass yourself