Crouching

“

Ey, here's something you can invent next time: Duckin'! Click to listen — The Scout

”

Crouching is a feature that reduces the area of your character, making you a smaller and less visible target. This can make tasks such as defending Sentry Guns, sniping, pushing Payload carts and ambushing easier. Crouch-jumping also facilitates rocket jumping, and crouch-jumping will increase the distance one jumps. Some obstacles require you to crouch-jump on top or over them as crouching in mid-air brings your legs and feet up.

When crouching, the character will move much slower than the default movement speed. But unlike running, your backward and forward speeds are identical. The default key for a crouch is Ctrl in the PC version, in the PlayStation 3 version, and in the Xbox 360 version. Crouching can be selected to toggle in the "Options" menu.

When crouching, your character will move 66% slower except when you are a Sniper who is scoped in (98.67% slower) or aiming an arrow (85% slower) or a Heavy with his Minigun revved (immobile).

Crouching does not increase your accuracy when firing a weapon, unlike in other Source games.

Crouching speeds

Class	Speed	abs
Scout	44.4%	133.33v
Medic	35.5%	106.67v
Engineer (while hauling a building)	33.3% 25%	100v 75v
Pyro (with Gas Jockey's Gear)	33.3% 36.7%	100v 110v
Sniper (with rifle zoomed) (with Huntsman drawn)	33.3% 1.33% 15%	100v 4v 45v
Spy	33.3%	100v
Demoman (Eyelander or HHHH and 1 head) (Eyelander or HHHH and 2 heads) (Eyelander or HHHH and 3 heads) (Eyelander or HHHH and 4 heads) (Scotsman's Skullcutter)	31.1% 34% 36% 39% 41% 26%	93.33v 101v 108v 116v 123v 79v
Soldier (Escape Plan with 121-160 HP) (Escape Plan with 81-120 HP) (Escape Plan with 41-80 HP) (Escape Plan with 1-40 HP)	26.6% 29.3% 32% 37.3% 42.7%	80v 88v 96v 112v 128v
Heavy (with Minigun spinning) (with G.R.U. drawn) (under effects of Buffalo Steak Sandvich)	25.5% (Immobile) 0% 33.2% 34.5%	76.67v 0v 99.67v 103.5v

• Note: abs = absolute values in velocity units (v).

Update history

October 2, 2007 Patch

• Fixed headshots not always registering for crouched players.

April 1, 2008 Patch

• Fixed crouch-jump exploit that allowed players to get outside of the world

October 14, 2009 Patch

• Added server ConVar "bot_crouch" to make bots crouch

See also

• Speed
• Jumping
• Spycrab