Gentleman Jon —Just when the world needed a hero, newly crowned benevolent dictator Hildreth stepped forward to save us from a Highlander world dominated by tyrannical overlord in waiting (and compiler of maimed log files) Bulow. Before we begin this season’s statistical Highlander review let’s pause for a moment to reflect and collectively thank Hildreth for holding back the tide.
In this review I promise to do a better job of examining the Heavy class contribution, revealing which of the myriad new spies came closest to knocking Inso off his perch, and once again shit-talk all Pyros in comparison to Steve by default (apologies to other Pyros in advance).
After the Highlander auto-log detection debacle I can assure concerned readers each log included has been hand-picked with the utmost care. I’ve messed about with the rating player ordering I use as well, but this isn’t really the place to explain it.
So let’s dive into the infinite depths of the statistical vortex and discover why all your votes were wrong.
Demomen
The graph shows damage per minute in blue, K/D ratio in red and the player rating in yellow. The K/D is measured against the top axis while DPM and rating against the bottom axis.
This illustrates the relationship between damage and kills for the individual players. The yellow bar is the average damage they get for every landed shot and is measured against the bottom axis. The blue bar is the amount of damage they had to cause to register a kill or assist and is also measured against the bottom axis. The red bar is the number of kills achieved per minute, which is measured by the top axis.
Huhy and Hildreth stand clear at the top of the ratings as the most aggressive demos both with excellent KD as well, with the stacked demo ruling the roost thanks to his success in taking down key targets, posting a superior kill rate and showing strong objective based play. Kaidus and Lalli appear to have been forced to trade survivability to maintain their aggression, while Quintosh and Kaylus went the other way sacrificing damage to stay alive.
Emilio Estevez’s suppressed stats reflect Kill Switch’s relatively disappointing and drama filled season, but both he and Joe had a similar ratio of damage to survivability but couldn’t quite match Hildreth and Huhy.
Joe had a strong kill rate reflecting how important his fragging is in Its All Good’s combo but was just pipped by Huhy and equal with Hildreth. Of the top demos Huhy converted his damage most efficiently into a kill or assist, although Kaylus was even more choosey with his damage apparently focusing on the kill and not spamming as indiscriminately as his peers.
The mid table demos were least well rewarded for doing damage, either coming off 2nd best in deathmatch too often or not having the benefit of teammates following up on their damage.
The true test of skill
Normally I’d use these stats to crown the truly skilled demo but this is more of a hall of shame. There’s only one scout in Highlander compared to 6v6 but still these are weak figures, and where the hell is Kaidus? No direct pipe scout kills all season it seems, anyone would think he didn’t care about it.
Weapon use
With absurdly powerful base weapons there obviously wasn’t much variation from the basics for most demos, however there were some wrinkles amongst the melees. Quintosh was the most efficient caber detonator managing 6 caber kills and one follow up from the melee, with Kaidus and Lalli just behind him. Kaylus and Huhy had to satisfy themselves with only managing post explosion caber melee kills while Hildreth got one of each.
Joe didn’t bother with any of that nonsense, being the only demo to register a Ham kill all season. Lalli was also the proud possessor of the only Loose Cannon kill.
Soldiers
Muuki is clearly the most successfully aggressive soldier, getting top damage and the fastest kill rate and despite this aggression posting a superior KD to everyone except Zoob. Zebbosai ranks second based on his smarter style, less reliant on naked aggression but achieving the 2nd best kill rate. Zoob’s more conservative style is a result of his objective based play placing him third.
The lower ranked soldiers had a clear pattern of having to cause more and more damage to get a kill, while their kill rate declined. Swi in particular struggled with a poor KD indicating that he spent a huge amount of time staring at the spawn queue.
The top 2 were also the most prolific medic killers amongst the soldiery.
Weapon Use
The black box got a lot of use with Zoob, Muuki and TausoN the most common users although stock is still the favourite. Of the other unlocks the direct hit got some sporadic use, and Ond kaja was the most experimental also registering kills with the Cow Mangler and Beggar’s Bazooka.
Scouts
What is this blasphemy?? It’s incredibly tight at the top but by the wispiest of nipple hairs Abra gets the nod. Stylistically he’s very similar to Lazybear but just pips him in every metric. Sorex on the other hand is somewhat different, playing more aggressively but not posting as high a kill rate and didn’t focus objectives as strongly as the others, but his damage pushed him slightly in front of Lazybear.
Issun also played aggressively but he took the most damage to get a kill or assist supressing his kill rate. Atomic on the other hand had a very good kill rate but was too conservative to get into the top tier statistically and wasn’t as objective focused.
Dennia and Sorex appear to be the most consist meat shotters, or may simply eschew the pistol and Abra, Issun and Buttnose look to have spammed the most long range chip damage.
One metric in which Abra was behind was Demo kills where Lazybear and Sorex were well ahead. No scout posed much of a threat to medics, although Dennia was a bit further ahead in that respect. In the spy hunting stakes Lazybear, Issun and Abra were well ahead of the pack.
Weapon Use
It’s almost all Scattergun and Pistol or their re-skins, with only Dennia making significant use of the FaN. Lazybear chalked up a single Atomizer kill.
Snipers
In what may come as a surprise to most, based purely on the basic stats described here Grand Master Rev who played for Splendid/Fair Enough tops the ratings. This is down to a clear lead in damage done, and although his kill rate wasn’t the highest he certainly got plenty of high damage shots in.
Paradox makes a rare foray into the top positions by an Electric Temptations player, no doubt making the most of massive pings. His KD wasn’t the best as he obviously put himself in danger a lot but the kill rate was the best of any sniper.
Elysium rounds out the top 3 for Chessclub playing a more conservative game looking after his KD at the expense of a bit of aggression. Droso also appears to be a bit conservative coming mid table upholding the honour of the 6v6 snipers.
Although Fanny and Kcot didn’t rack up massive stats and bring up the rear in this section they were clearly strongly objective focused. In fact the oddly reversed positions of a sniper’s team’s success and their ability to post top stats seems to say something about the conditions they can do it in. Are the top rated snipers merely benefitting from a killing field full of enemies who are sitting ducks having crushed the rest of the sniper’s team? They’re certainly usually well out of the action. Using this rationale phromelo is a strong candidate for the plaudits, and sniper seems to be the ultimate bait-your-team-for-stats class.
Phromelo gives the most nightmares to medics forcing 6 uber drops, and as far as the purists go hitting the highest rate of headshots. Rev hits the lowest number, indicating a lot of fully charged bodyshots went into that damage total – a matter of practicality over style. Paradox’s high damage figures also seem to be propped up in the same way.
Droso bring his 6v6 focus on medic drops to his Highlander sniper play along with RouHe, who along with kcot post the 2nd and 3rd fastest headshot rate.
Bodily Fluids
Like festival goers everywhere snipers know that throwing a container of your own piss can have devastating consequences. Few however can match Snow’s enthusiasm and commitment to sharing nature’s bounty managing more than twice the amount than his nearest competitor.
Player’s eschewing the urinary projectile include the puritanical American paradox, Droso – proving that 6v6 players are clearly more civilised even if they’re from Belgium – and Elysium who must feel like a man locked into the monkey’s enclosure at the zoo amongst his Highlander brethren.
Heavy
After upsetting some of the Heavy mains by giving them a mere cursory treatment last season I’ll try to uncover a bit more about the players behind the minigun and slow moving fat man this time around.
Splendid/Fair Enough had two heavies that played enough for inclusion in this list and it’s Qnai who comes out on top. This includes games against Highpander, It’s All Good, Chessclub and Kill Switch so we’re not talking about games against easy targets.
Qnai’s combination of effective aggression, damage output and objective focus puts her on top. Jamal and Atomicus had better kill rates but generally didn’t put out as much general damage. Smzi also struggled comparatively in this regard, he just couldn’t get out of the smart 6v6 scout mind set into the wildly spamming minigun one.
BreakfasT in third spot had a markedly aggressive style posting a poor KD combined with a high kill rate. It’s hard not to reach the conclusion that slightly more conservative play on his part could have produced some seriously improved results.
Once again the unfortunate kKaltUu suffers from having to try to keep Bulow alive no doubt saving his team from countless uber drops through his own sacrifice.
Kill Preferences
Smzi was not just the top Spy hunter amongst the heavies but top in the whole league, no doubt driven to spy paranoia due to Admirable’s weakness to spies (more on this later). This may well have curtailed his aggression. Qnai, Jamal and Piddox also posted some strong spy hunting totals.
These days Highlander strategy leans towards the demoman being the spearhead of uber pushes (who knew he could cover more ground than the heavy?) and faced with this agile destructive opponent Jamal and Piddox had the most success standing their ground and shredding the incoming opposition combo. Smzi also did creditably here as did Marty, although he got to play the easy games Qnai didn’t.
Smzi, Qnai and BreakfasT were very closely matched in aerial defence taking down numerous bombing soldiers, with Piddox also doing well in this regard.
In the all-important heavy on heavy encounters Piddox was clearly supreme with Atomicus and BreakfasT posting decent numbers. Smzi having done well in most other elements notably suffered in this area and it’s probably what led to his disappointing overall placing. Lack of healing at the vital moment or more practice jumping around corners spun up required?
Heavies also led the way when it came to Pyro frags, with Jamal and Piddox out in front and Qnai a close 3rd.
Weapon Use
Although the Heavy has a plethora of unlocks to choose from none of them match up to the minigun or its re-skins which completely dominates all kills by any heavy. Note to Valve, do something more interesting with the Heavy minigun alternatives to make them more viable. Then we can ban them.
Spy
Last season Inso dominated the Spy class by such an enormous margin many teams tried new faces there in the hope of closing the gap to an area where It’s All Good enjoyed uncontested supremacy. Could anyone close the gap on the man who is now probably too good for Epsilon?
The short answer is no, although Solid and Grenjabob are probably closer now than anyone was last season. Inso is miles ahead in KD and kill rate. The damage stats for spies is a bit misleading as it tends to vary a lot based on the reliance on backstabbing the spy has, backstabs producing very high damage numbers.
Even so as we can see Inso’s base damage number is high but his damager per landed shot is relatively low indicating that he didn’t rely on inflated knife damage and just hit a lot of shots. This is a more useful type of damage as the team can follow up on it. Or maybe he just played a lot on servers with the real damage plugin.
As we can see accusations that Inso, or Solid, are one dimensional ambassador spies are wide of the mark with both posting a balanced distribution of headshot and backstab kills. Interestingly here Acooma has a very high backstab rate and good headshot rate as well but his overall kill rate wasn’t that impressive. It seems a lack of standard butter knife or revolver kills let him down.
Grenjabob’s relatively heavy reliance on backstabs as a method of assassination is clear here.
Weapon Use
Inso has marginally the highest use of the dead ringer ahead of tutorial, but once again it falls to Grenjabob to uphold the traditional spy methods, completely eschewing it in favour of the more orthodox watches.
Unlike most classes the spy has a plethora of viable unlocks. Inso and Solid made most use of the Ambassador and Spycicle with occasional use of the Revolver (and in Solid’s case the standard knife every now and then) whilst Grenjabob by comparison was loyal to a fault to the classic knife and revolver combo.
Acooma was the only other spy favouring the knife over the Spycicle, but he did make more use of the Ambassador. Khazul heavily favoured the stock revolver over the ambassador. The Le’tranger saw use by most spies, but being obviously limited in combat it only showed up sparingly in the logs.
Pyro
It’s no real surprise to see Steve once again topping the stats with his relative freedom to roam, settings a kill rate and KD well in excess of his competitors.
Meanwhile ETF2L overlord Permzilla further enhances his reputation as the ultimate all-rounder achieving best of the rest status thanks to solid aggressive play including a focus on the objective, something that also benefitted Rudey and Scissors.
Generally speaking amongst the rest there seems to be a pretty obvious dichotomy between pyros with a bit more license to roam showing aggression and those tied to their medic, with the top two, Scissors, Ascendary and Hard Ass Johnny showing a lot of aggression and Rudey, Candle and b33p playing more carefully.
Rudey and b33p had efficient damage in their defensive roles using the least damage to get a kill. This stands in stark contrast to Hard Ass Johnny who, despite his apparent aggression, has a very slow kill rate with mountains of damage piled up apparently without effect.
Kill Preferences
Despite the enduring protestations that Steve gets to buff his stats by leaving his medic to die, he had the fastest kill rate of any Pyros against Spies and Demos and was 2nd to Rudey against Soldiers who are all the most typical medic killer classes typically within the Pyros range (Snipers safely baiting their team from the back). However as a share of his total kills these classes didn’t really feature, which is indicative of his ability to take on a wider range of targets than other Pyros.
The more defensive Pyros didn’t seem to excel against any of the typical medic pick classes either in terms of kill rate apart from spies, so it seems there was a big trade-off for heavy spy checking in terms of general effectiveness, the commitment producing diminishing returns.
Weapon Use
In Season 5 it was the flare gun, but in Season 6 the Pyro shotgun has made a big comeback with only Rudey, Ascendary and b33p favouring the flare gun. Melee kills were relatively rare, and although the Axtinguisher was the favourite by some way the Powerjack also saw some regular use. Actual Flamethrower kills were less common than reflects with only Steve really putting up decent numbers.
The ultimate test of Pyro skill
That’s it, the crown has passed on, Rudey is now, regardless of any other preamble, definitively the top Pyro in EU Highlander. Permzilla… smh.
Engineers
Lenny for It’s All Good sits atop the Engie list putting out clearly the biggest damage total and producing the fastest kill rate of all engineers, as well as recording an epic KD.
There’s almost a three way tie immediately below, with Zimmer just sneaking 2nd place for Splendid/Fair Enough with the tie breaker being a healthy commitment to the objective. This is Evil Evil sneaks 3rd over Freakie on damage output, although both shared the most efficient use of their damage output in terms of kills and assists.
The widely hated mini sentry is by far the fastest killing machine across the board for all engineers, but there is a broad variation between effective use of high level sentries with Lenny and Nijoonen leading the way with level 3 kills and Lenny and This is Evil Evil top on the level 2s.
Although This Is Evil Evil got a very high kill rate with the mini sentries his build rate is actually low, so kills per build is probably quite high for him. Freakie seemed the least concerned with team support building, although perhaps their placement was so good they were infrequently destroyed. Most Engies found themselves building more teleporters than dispensers although Lenny and This Is Evil Evil favoured the dispenser.
Weapon Use
The shotgun is still the main killing machine for the prem Engie, with only Musa registering more mini sentry kills than shotgun kills. Fenrir and Musa were the main practitioners of Frontier Justice. In Melee no particular wrench was more successful than any other, although anyone getting too close to Musa was likely to get a robot arm in the face.
Medics
Bulow’s hands were so sweaty he could barely keep hold of the mouse, surely this time there would be no specious reasoning to come between him and the prize? There was only one man he feared, his countryman, but he was sure that simply jumping in from 6v6 semi-retirement he’d been schooled by the Highlander pros. He licked his lips nervously, his mouth suddenly dry as the first graph scrolled into view…
Sprayer bags the best KAD but, like Jakeowaty, it was obviously at the expense of healing in combat (or successful combat anyway) as his assist rate is amongst the lowest recorded. In comparison Skeej and Admirable, and to a lesser extent Fool, managed to combine good KAD with high assist rates. Shep and The Sucker sacrificed survivability to get good assists while Bulow managed to combine the worst of both worlds, although this was probably partly down to kKaltUu’s poor kill rate.
Admirable enjoys the fastest uber rate, followed by Shep and Skeej but with clearly lower drop rates than both. The closest comparable performance is Sprayer. Jakeowaty and TheSucker have the slowest uber rates, although only TheSucker could lead the uber drop table with such emphatic style. Bulow and Fool enjoy the anonymity of mediocrity.
Medic Killers
This illustrates the top 20 medic killers in the season on any class and their rate of forcing the medic to drop uber. The timescale is per hour giving a reasonable idea of how many medic kills or uber drops a match may contain.
This is how It’s All Good stay competitive and keep control of the uber mechanic with Bulow at the controls of their own ubers. Muuki is by far the most prolific medic assassin with Inso about the same distance again to the 3rd placed player. This ability to suppress the opposition’s uber building is a huge advantage, and the fact it’s with two classes who are generally speaking solo operators means it happens without a great deal of tactical planning necessary.
Soldiers dominate the top of the list, with zoob and Zebbosai racking up the body count. Demomen dominate the middle of the table, with a scattering of spies mixed in. Top sniper is Phromelo, preferring to bide his time for the medic picks than take any shot going.
Tutorial took top honours for causing uber drops closely followed by Inso and Lalli, although of course in Inso’s case the medic’s lucky to live long enough to get it anyway.
6v6 scout refugee Dennia was the most medic focused scout carrying habits over between games modes.
FYI I Am a Spy
Last season it was Inso showing up the medical fraternity, repeatedly backstabbing medics who were healing him at the time. This season the mantle is worn by committed knife artiste Grenjabob who managed to bag Thalash and Admirable. Excuses about facestabs and dodgy Irish internet abound.
(Statistical) Team of the Season
Hildreth and Joe may have been the big Highlander names on demo in the past, but the stats demand I pick Huhy whose superior kill rate trumped Hildreth’s raw damage.
On soldier it’s no contest, Muuki wins hands down combining general high quality soldier play with free constant uber advantage.
Amongst the scouts the king is dead, long live Abra. Although a detailed breakdown may show that Lazybear takes on higher value targets change is good and I don’t think I’ll lose much if anything.
Sniper is a tricky judgement and the first class where it gets subjective. It seems there is genuinely a link between a team’s weakness and the opportunities for a sniper to do well statistically, so I’m going with Phromelo for being the best playoff team sniper and for being a leading medic killer. And for showing some restraint with jars of piss.
The Heavy selection is pretty simple, Qnai may not have played the whole season but she played against the cream and did well, as well as ranking well in medic defence. Heavy vs Heavy might be a weak point, but it’s hard to find a player who does well at that as well as everything else. Piddox might be a better medic defender and Heavy vs Heavy practitioner if you don’t mind losing out on the general kills and damage.
If Numlocked re-joins Epsilon properly and they get back to i49 levels they might just be good enough to get Inso in on spy. Until then they probably don’t deserve him.
Steve is another perennial self-selector, although you can always go with Rudey for reflect fun, who is also the strongest pure defence Pyro.
Lenny is another no brainer on Engineer and there isn’t really a contrast of styles with any other engineer to choose from. A lack of mini sentry building is easily compensated for by skill with the shotgun.
And so to Medic. It’s hard to see past Admirable for his uber rate and relatively modest drop rate as well as exhibiting plenty of bravery in combat.
Finally as copied from Mia’s article a quick reminder:
The Highlander Season 6 Awards Show will air on Sunday 8th June at 20 CEST on Blackout TV, it will be hosted by Ryushi, Getawhale and Jon and with Hildreth, Bulow, Scissors and Deox as guests. Tune in tomorrow for an article about Prem teams post-season and what the prospect looks like for Highlander Season 7.
Originally published on VanillaTV (vanillatf2.org) on 2014-06-07 by diemasher.
Recovered from the Internet Archive (archived copy) as part of tf2esports.com's preservation of VanillaTV's TF2 coverage. The original site is no longer online. All rights remain with the original author; reposted for historical reference.