Basic Medic strategy
| “ | Ze healing leaves little time for ze hurting.
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— The Medic
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The Medic is arguably the most important class on a team. He is the only class with a reliable way to heal and overheal teammates using his Medi Gun, making him invaluable. The medic is the only class where if the opposing team has one and you don't, you are put at a severe disadvantage in any game mode. As the Medic heals others, he builds an ÜberCharge meter. Once full, he can provide invulnerability with the Medi Gun, Crit-boost a teammate with the Kritzkrieg, or perform rapid healing with the Quick-Fix to turn the tide of battle. Because dying means losing any accumulated ÜberCharge, it is incredibly important that the Medic survives any fight. The Medic's weapons are designed more for self-protection than direct combat; he relies on having good teammates to protect him so that he is free to keep his team alive. More than with any other class, communication is key, both for indicating who to heal and when to activate an ÜberCharge.
Primary weapons
Your ability to heal others will often make you the primary target of many enemy players. When in combat, be hard to hit: jump, duck, and strafe to avoid damage. Your natural health regeneration will often not be enough to keep you alive, so rely on your allies for protection and ask them to leave health pickups for you. Unless you are forced to fight, you should retreat if all nearby teammates are defeated.
Syringe Gun
The Syringe Gun fires rapidly and deals fair damage at close range only. It should only be used as a last resort when directly confronted by enemies; the moderate damage can dissuade them from pursuing you. Instead of directly engaging enemies, call for your teammates to protect you as you heal them instead. If you're forced into combat, you may need to aim upwards slightly and lead targets accordingly to compensate for the slow projectile speed; the Syringe Gun's needles travel slowly in a parabolic arc. Do not attempt to attack enemies with the Syringe Gun - exposing yourself in combat will often get you killed.
Blutsauger + reskins
The Blutsauger heals you for 3 health for each shot that hits an enemy, but lowers your natural health regeneration. Take out the Blutsauger if you're injured and can afford to briefly stop healing others; landing shots consistently will heal you more than your natural regeneration can. It's best to equip this weapon only if you expect to be directly confronted by enemies, as the decreased regeneration leaves you vulnerable to damage-over-time effects such as fire or bleeding. Although the Blutsauger is your most powerful weapon in a direct fight, exposing yourself in a firefight will often get you killed. Attempt to stay behind your allies; you are still your team's main source of healing. If your team reliably protects you from enemies, equip a different weapon to retain your regeneration and gain some extra utility.
Crusader's Crossbow + reskins
Depending on which team you shoot at, bolts from the Crusader's Crossbow can damage enemies or heal allies, with the power of the shot increasing the farther it travels. The Crossbow reloads passively, so you can switch between healing normally and supporting teammates outside the range of your Medi Gun. Although the the bolts travel relatively quickly compared to other primary weapons, the Crossbow's slow fire rate makes it less effective than the Syringe Gun in close-range combat. You may need to tell your allies to stand still so you can land up long-range healing shots. The Crossbow builds ÜberCharge more slowly than the Medi Gun, so use the Medi Gun to heal nearby allies instead if possible. The crossbow is regarded the the best medic primary in the most situations due to its invaluable burst healing that can outclass the heal rate of the Medi gun - essential if you need to heal a large array of teammates quickly. The crossbow is also useful for healing roaming and flanking classes such as soldiers, scouts and spies as they're most commonly in combat far away from the medic and his combo.
Overdose
Depending on how full your ÜberCharge meter is, the Overdose grants up to 20% additional movement speed. This weapon makes it easier to dodge projectiles or flee from enemies if you're under attack. In particular, the extra speed increases the odds that you won't have to waste your ÜberCharge in self-defense. The movement speed bonus only applies when the Overdose is your active weapon, so healing teammates will return you to normal speed. The Overdose deals slightly less damage in combat, encouraging you to seek help from teammates to preserve ÜberCharge instead of fighting enemies. The maximum speed bonus is still not enough to outrun an aggressive Scout, so you may still need to turn and fight regardless.
Secondary weapons
To make use of your healing abilities, you'll need to team up with an ally. Generally speaking, you first want to heal other Medics, then combat classes, then support classes. You cannot heal yourself, so stay behind your Medic buddy so that he can take all of the damage. Your healing beam bends around corners and stays locked onto patients, so stay behind cover and turn around frequently to watch for ambushes. As you heal allies, the ÜberCharge meter will gradually fill up. It fills more quickly if you are healing wounded allies, so spread your healing evenly during moments of downtime. Once your ÜberCharge is ready, communicate with your team to make the best use out of your chosen effect.
Medi Gun + reskins
Most of the time, you will equip the Medi Gun for the standard ÜberCharge. Compared to your other choices, the Medi Gun charges the slowest but arguably has the most powerful effect. The 8 seconds of invincibility it provides is useful in almost any situation, but other ÜberCharges will often be ready before yours. An offensive ÜberCharge lets your team push into almost any defensive encampment, particularly those with Sentry Guns. Invincibility is especially useful on defense, especially if your team is outnumbered or needs to hold a contested area. Additionally, you can counter an enemy Medic's ÜberCharge by deploying your own, preferably just after his finishes. If you are in danger of being killed, activate your ÜberCharge in self-defense: it's better to survive than to die with a full meter. You can keep multiple targets ÜberCharged at once by quickly switching your healing beam between them, at the cost of it draining significantly faster.
Kritzkrieg
The Kritzkrieg functions similarly to the Medi Gun, but charges 25% faster and provides 8 seconds of guaranteed Critical hits to its target instead of invulnerability. It provides a faster, riskier and more offensive ÜberCharge, as the Kritzkrieg's ÜberCharge does not protect you. It's best for situations where you need to quickly eliminate as many targets as possible so your team can push forward. Great candidates for the Kritzkrieg are the Soldier, Demoman, and Heavy, classes that deal damage over a wide area and can use the crit boost to the fullest. Because your meter charges faster, it is best to deploy the Kritzkrieg as soon as possible, before Medi Gun-wielding Medics are fully charged. Sentry Guns are not affected by critical hits, so using the Kritzkrieg's ÜberCharge to destroy Engineer nests is ineffective. Due to its faster charge. the Kritzkrieg can be an effective choice as you can build Kritz before the enemy medic/s can build Ubercharge if you both begin building charge at the same time.
Quick-Fix
The Quick-Fix heals teammates the fastest of your secondary weapons, making it useful for keeping multiple injured teammates alive during combat. You also copy the explosive jumps of a friendly Soldier or Demoman when healing them, allowing you to keep up easily. However, the Quick-Fix can only overheal allies to 125% of their max health rather than 150%, meaning that your team will be at a disadvantage at the beginning of fights, when your enemies are presumably fully overhealed. The Quick-Fix's ÜberCharge triples the rate of healing, grants immunity to knockback, and charges 10% faster than the Medi Gun, but does not prevent lethal damage or allow contesting of objectives. Thus, the Quick-Fix is best used to maintain momentum rather than protect an area; if an enemy Medic accumulates a full ÜberCharge, the invincibility offered by the Medi Gun or the crit boost offered by the Kritzkrieg can overpower your boosted healing. Other sources of large burst damage such as sticky traps and close range encounters with a Heavy can also overpower your healing.
Vaccinator
When healing an ally with the Vaccinator, you can cycle between granting the two of you a 10% resistance to either bullets, explosions, or fire. Its ÜberCharge, which builds 67% faster and is stored in 4 smaller bars, increases the chosen resistance to 75% for 2.5 seconds. The Vaccinator's defensive capabilities, combined with the reduced overheal rate, are best used to maintain an immediate advantage at the front lines. In fights, adjust the Vaccinator to face whatever weapons your enemies carry. For example, a Pyro can always deal fire damage, but may have a Shotgun, which deals bullet damage. The Vaccinator deploys its ÜberCharge as shields, which persist even if you change healing targets. Thus, you can rapidly place shields on multiple teammates or stack them on the same target to protect against multiple damage types. Note that the Vaccinator's ÜberCharge rate is significantly reduced when healing targets at full health; to build charge faster, heal injured teammates first. The Vaccinator is by far the most convoluted and tricky Medi gun to equip, so you will need some practice before you can utilise the weapon to its full potential.
Melee weapons
Bonesaw + reskins
The Bonesaw is useful for striking distracted opponents but still loses to the Syringe Gun in damage over time. There is no reason to use the Bonesaw; all of your other melee weapons possess some sort of utility and are generally seen as straight upgrades because Medics rarely engage in combat.
Ubersaw + reskins
The Ubersaw swings slightly slower than the Bonesaw, a minor drawback compared to the 25% boost your ÜberCharge meter receives for each successful hit on an enemy. Landing a few strikes on an enemy that fails to defeat you can grant a ready ÜberCharge and an instant advantage. For defensive purposes, it can be used to quickly fill the Medi Gun's meter, then escape with the resulting invincibility. Actively entering combat to build charge with the Ubersaw can be risky, as it leaves your team without a healer, not to mention that every class has access to a weapon that outranges your melee strikes. When using the Ubersaw, there is a significant risk and reward. The risk being your death, robbing your team of heals and your current Ubercharge meter, but the reward of a powerful 25% boost to your Ubercharge meter which can turn the tide of battle.
Vita-Saw
The Vita-Saw grants minor ÜberCharge insurance. Hitting an enemy with it harvests an Organ; each Organ lets you retain 15% of your ÜberCharge upon dying, up to a cap of 60%. As a Medic, you will inevitably become a priority target for the enemy team. If your ÜberCharge is not fully charged and you are cornered, fight back with the Vita-Saw to ensure at least some of your hard work remains after death. Of course, the small -10 health penalty might mean you die more often against burst damage; offset this by equipping anything except the Blutsauger to maintain good health regeneration. The Vita-Saw is useless in situations where you cannot respawn, such as Arena or Sudden Death.
Amputator
While you're holding the Amputator, you regenerate 3 extra health per second, useful for negating damage-over-time effects such as afterburn and bleeding. This increased regeneration is also useful for general escapes when your team can't be healed/doesn't need to be healed as the extra health gain can sometimes mean the difference between you dying or living. Taunting will play a melody that heals all nearby allies that are not obstructed by cover. This melody doesn't build much ÜberCharge and leaves you defenceless for four seconds, so play it only when you absolutely need to heal multiple teammates at once. The taunt is particularly effective is narrow choke points where lots of your teammates gather; found frequently in maps such as Dustbowl. The Amputator deals 20% less damage than the Bonesaw but is still considered an upgrade because as the Medic, you'll rarely engage in melee combat.
Solemn Vow
The Solemn Vow allows you to see enemy health, names, and ÜberCharge percentage, like the Spy'. While you heal teammates, also spend time looking at the enemy - you can tell your team about weakened foes and the ÜberCharge state of enemy Medics. If you are alone, this ability helps you decide whether to fight or run from a pursuing enemy. The Solemn Vow suffers a 10% attack speed penalty, which is practically negligible for its benefits.
See also
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