TF2: Random Crits are Good

I really, really wish I could agree with the mindset of the average TF2 player. But it seemed like a lot of you guys wanted to see this video, so here we are.

Also I apologize if it isn't as refined as you'd expect. I've been working on several short films recently and unfortunately real life takes priority over making videos about a 11 year old game. But I do plan on continuing to make content to TF2 as well as maybe uploading some of the funnier shorts I'm working on. Thanks for your support none the less, gonna try to make everyone happy

Have a swell day and peace out

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Other songs: Sean Evans - Detection

[Rydercycle]

I feel like the editing in this video sucks. NGL it wasn't my top priority because like college. But I'm trying to do both

[mysterymastermind]

"You can't random crit as Engineer"

*Laughs while holding the Jag*

[dogebrownstonks]

Everyone going on about random crits
While i'm wanting Valve to remove Bullet Spread

[spencerbrown]

The best part of tf2 is that it's an amazing balance of goofiness and skill. A sweaty try hard will still find goofy moments and a troldier will still pull of extremely skillfull moments. This Ying and yang aspect is brought together by the games balance, a scout beating me down to a pulp with a fish is funny and goofy and a demoman hitting air shot on me is bad ass and cool the only thing they have in common is that it's balanced. Those kills were fair and deserved but they still keep that "fun goofiness" and "badassery" without being unfair. Tf2 is a multi-player game so it has to be balanced for those playstyles to even grow. If tf2 was a 100% try hard game with no balance all it would be is people abusing overpowered weapons and if tf2 was a 100% goofy game with no balance it would have so much rng it would be unfun. People who say random crits need to go aren't competitive players we barely have a comp scene (so the point that you make about going to our broken competitive system is dumb) most of them are just pubbers that love that mix of goofy and skill brought together by balance and critical hit override apart of that balance. Yall act like if random crits went free to players would leave because they would get good instead of being led astray by random crits (but even if f2ps evolved to be good players we still have an abundance of new players flowing in) and that if we got rid of them half of the games goofiness would be gone. Nah yall gotcha hats, yall gotcha fun weapon ideas, yall gotcha dumb load outs, yall gotcha funny characters, taunts, map ideas and more.

[_british]

of course the heavy main is pro random crits

[BigJoeySlaps]

*#KeepRandomCrits*

*WARNING: Long opinion incoming from other heavy main, 7 year TF2 player, with near 4, 000 hours in-game.*

*1. Crits are fun, and crits keep TF2 casual interesting.*
For over 10 years, they've been a unique FPS feature granted ONLY in TF2 (unless I'm missing any game(s) I don't know of here) that players won't experience in any other game. Not only does it keep casual games from remaining dull, predictable, or just a game of what team is better, but it keeps people on their toes. To me, random crits feel similar to random knockouts in UFC games... it makes you feel the threat that you're not as entirely safe as you may always feel, and so you need to always play with stealth if you ever want to hit those big killstreaks. And considering this game is a war simulator, I do enjoy that realistic fear
*2. Random crits do often break stalemates.*
It's true. Happened to me literally just a day or 2 ago. Went on a 38 killstreak, got hit by a direct hit, crit rocket and BOOM. Suddenly the opposite team could advance again... and even though we still won, my point is that often random crits do actually help stop pubstompers so that new players don't just feel stuck and hopeless like in other games (Halo, COD, Destiny, etc) Sometimes just by taking out a top player, the other team will finally score and that keeps it exciting for both sides.
*3. Random crits do not encourage bad skill*
...At least, not near as much as you've been made out to believe. Believe it or not, unless your favorite TF2 Youtuber or comp player has strictly ONLY played comp TF2 since their beginning hours, they too have played casuals and they too have used crits! But you know what happens after they hit their lucky crit? They keep playing the game. And they keep playing the game. And they learn valuable skills over time. It's literally 1 or 2 moments in an entire 30-60 minute game each. Believe me, as soon as the crit is gone, they are still stuck playing normal for most of the game and they will have to eventually learn regular skills if they want to ever get good at the game.
*4. Random crits are silly and funny*
*5. Casual does not need to be as close to comp as possible*
People can still grow to be great players with or without random crits presence... so again, there's not really a need to delete them. Casual can be like Super Smash Bros with items turned on, while games with no crits turned on can be like those try-hard, no-items matches on Final Destination. Besides, we already have places for comp players to train (although admittedly, not as great as we would wish for... which brings me to my next point....)
*6. Fix this instead Valve*
Finally make an enjoyable in-game comp mode that people actually want to play. If you need help, you could literally just jump on over to tf2center and take notes. Add some cosmetic rewards in there and some cool badges, and wa-la. I bet more people will actually play.
*7. And lastly, just like Dane feels he shouldn't HAVE to play comp to play with no crits...*
We (more than half of the existing TF2 community) don't feel we should have to play WITHOUT them either just because some people don't like them. *It's a 10 year old feature. Get stealthier. Maybe take yourself a little less seriously. And just try and hit them back with one ;)*

- <3 Big J

[JoJo-zcxm]

This conversation has been going on for a long time, at this point i don't see valve actually doing something about random crits on casual

[tectonical]

Lack of random crits wont stop me from fish slapping an enemy, it will just stop me from strateigically wearing someone down, going for the final blow then being blasted into the shadow realm when i was full.

[Lalaoz]

"unless your enginner, then you probably don't like random crits"
Engineer mains: hold my beer
*Unsheathes wrench*

[invhazion]

I always felt as if I would be at least a little sad if they removed them

[sharqueeshajohnalaneesha]

8:36 The Half Zatoichi doesn’t get random crits anymore

[Paddy]

“Just play comp”
You’re joking, right?

[StickMaster]

If Valve doesn’t remove random crits, then they have to at least change how crits works like making it only available on melee weapons, making it so getting kills doesn’t increase the chances of getting a random crit, having an voting system to turn off random crits or making melee weapons have skilful crits like giving the Bonesaw the ability to crit when you have 100% Ubercharge while deals mini-crits on all the other melees making the Stock Melees more viable.

[krazy]

It’s not that I lost, it’s that I lost to no fault of my own.

[Skelly]

Honestly, the reason I dislike random crits is because i almost always have a negative experience with them. If I kill someone with a random crit, unless it was really stupid, then it’s kinda funny, but otherwise it just happens. Plus, when I die to a crits, it’s annoying. If it’s to an actual weapon, yeah it’s annoying, but melee crits are incredibly annoying. Imagine walking up to a sniper, he has no clue you’re here, you go for the kill, and he random crits you with his kukri. I honestly get more annoyed with melee crits, mainly because they deal so much damage. Also, valve’s competitive is pretty bad. It’s takes forever to find a match, and even then you’ll probably have a leaver and have to re-queue. Also, trying to gamble into winning in a fight where you shouldn’t win is a horrible mindset. It leads players to do stupid things when the odds are very much not in their favor. In all honestly, I don’t see many benefits to random crits. Sure, you can say they’re “fun” and how they add in some randomness, but TF2 is incredibly random as is. Tell me a black Scottish cyclops deciding to throw away his explosives to use a sword to kill people isn’t random enough. Plus, with 150ish weapons in the game, there’s still enough randomness in this game. Also, melees are still GREAT weapons. 65 damage is still a ton of damage. Demoknight is literally an entire subclass focused on melee with no random crits. I don’t think the game will become more toxic when random crits are removed. I do agree, training needs a HUGE overhaul. Also, removing random crits isn’t gonna turn casual into 12v12 Comp. people are still gonna play like idiots, and it’s still a giant clusterfuck. I know you’re probably not gonna read any of this, but I just wanted to share my two cents. Sorry for the rambling

[Delfy]

Actually - random crits are not so "random". The more damage you deal - the more crits you will get. The more crits you gain - the more kills you will do. So this is not so fair in my opinion.

[Bebe-fqyb]

Counter arguments


The compromises won't work
1. 'Making random crits more uncommon'
Whilst reducing the chances of getting basically instant killed by another class would be more unlikely, it can still happen so people will still get angry when they get killed by some random cross map crocket or some sticky spammer getting lucky and getting a crit. Also random crits work on a system in which the chance of getting a crit increases the more you do damage so it just negates the whole decrease in random crit chance as it will just go back up.


2. 'Making them melee only'
This also can't work. Melee weapons can do a random crit which will deal -195 hp so that means a medic for example can just sneek up on a heavy and random crit them twice, which does happen. Its so brain dead but effective leading to medic often bringing out their melee to get an easy kill. This of course applies to all classes. Not to mention long respawn times which can last about 20 seconds.


3. 'Making them do less damage'
Nope. It is still just some extra, undeserved damage which can just win a fight for you in the end easily. It literally won't change a thing.


Further more, the segment of hope is kind of stupid. The fact that you can kill a full health medic who deserves to kill you fair and square, get some uber to have fun and play the game is just not fair. They cant receive a reward which they should get, as in tf2 you learn that a heavy with low health is an easy kill, just cause of a roll the dice mechanic. You didnt deserve to live and the medic does not deserve to die. This just then leads to people always just running towards people with their melee weapon, which is supposed to be a last resort damage, and getting two kills, basically face stabbing people but its intended by the devs. Really melee weapons may need some rework as many are in the shadow of utility melee weapons (Atomizer, Whip, GRU)

Also just to add, not all people who want to win a game should not be told to go play comp. 12v12 casual is fun and gives players freedom in class choices or maybe go on big killstreaks, rather than following a strict meta with limited class choices and game modes. Maybe you want to win a game but want to play as a Backburner + Jetpack pyro which is fine. Sometimes when you play casual you'll meet chill or funny people like a random hoovy giving you a sandvich or encountering an enemy to which instead of shooting you, challenges you to a rock, paper, scissors game.
You say in the video that its not good to divide a community yet you basically say to people that if they want to play to win that they should leave casual and only play comp.

[de-ment]

so apparently if I hate random crits and get annoyed by them I'm a competitive player, well what if I think they're unfair cause they usually insta-kill me and I gotta wait another (max) 17 secs to respawn just so I get random chance for it to happen again? this isn't a gambling game it's a class based first person shooter.

answer's to other points made by ryder:

1.Even though I love random crits on melees aswell they should always be weapons you hsould use if you got nothing left and about to die, getting a random crit on them is as unfair as in normal gun fights, for an example lets say you find a clueless sniper and instead of killing him you wanted to have some fun and kill him with a melee or something else now how is it fair if he turns around as soon as you hit him and gets a crit on you? he's the one who didnt hear you he's the one who should die in that situation. other than that random crits can also fuck up melee fights.

2.random crits shouldnt be the "only option" in a situation where you and the enemy has a melee since you can dodge or bait the enemy if you have skill and in this game you should rely on your skill and not on your luck.

3.removing random crits cant kill pubs we arent telling the dev team to remove fun strats, weird guns or having multiple players play the same class we're telling them to remove random crits which heavily rely on luck.

In my opinion random crits has to go but the only middleground we can find right now is to change them into random mini crits.

[Kimri]

Well, i absolutely appreciate you taking the time and effort to express your thoughts as calmly and civil as you are, but aside the idea of a middle ground, which may probably justify, pretty much all of the remaining points failed to persuade me since they're rather subjective at best but that's completely understandable coming from an opinionated video like this.

However, it all seems to come down to to the fact that no matter how charming anyone claims random criticals to be, no one can ever seem to grossly justify the necessity for its existence with any valid objective arguments in comparison to all the points we've made all these times.

In addition to that, it may seem somewhat inconsiderate to keep bringing this topic of debate up every now and then and especially in this time of great TF2 crisis, but that's simply because the game is a decade-old and is starting to grow out of its prime. While i wholeheartedly love the game as a whole, i believe it needs a change for the better which in the end, doesn't really affect much the core experience it provides yet can improve the overall exprience of players even more. Furthermore, this is not some spontaneous ideas someone cooked up while they're bored but it's a 10-year-old process of arguments and that much effort needs a valid and deserving answer.

[toupeiragamer]

"If you have a competitiv mindset then go to competitive"

Yeah right, and the game not accepting my FPS boost scripts and crashing every time i try to join competitive plus giving me a penalty for "leaving" the match is very welcoming.