Sapper

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This article is about the stock building item for the Spy. For other sappers, see Sapper (disambiguation).
The silhouette shows that a Sapper can be applied to the building. Note the needle gauge is in the red.
A level 1 Sentry being sapped.
“
Spy's sappin' mah sentry!
Click to listen
— The Engineer
 ”

The Sapper, mentioned in the Sentry Operating Manual as the AM/FM Ultra-Sapper, is the default building weapon for the Spy. It is a small electric generator inscribed 'ELECTRO-SAPPER', with a carrying handle, two long yellow wires and a meter. It also features two clamps that are deployed when used.

The sole function of the Sapper is to destroy an Engineer's buildings. Should the player select the weapon and stand near an enemy structure, they are able to see a white outline of the Sapper on the building, indicating that it is in range and can be sapped. Additionally, the needle on the gauge moves to the right red zone. Pressing the primary fire key (default key: MOUSE1) attaches the weapon, and the building is slowly damaged until it is destroyed. A sapped building immediately ceases to function; Sentry Guns do not fire, Dispensers do not heal or dispense ammo, and Teleporters do not teleport. The Engineer is also unable to use his Destruction PDA to self-destruct a sapped building. When applied to buildings, the Sapper produces electrical sparks and a loud hissing noise. When a Sapper is attached to one end of a Teleporter, another Sapper is automatically placed on the other end of the Teleporter, if it exists and is not in building progress. If the Spy is disguised, the disguise class plays a distinct, unique animation of placing the device on the building. Unlike the Spy's other weapons, using a Sapper does not cause him to lose his disguise.

For each building the Spy player places a Sapper upon, a small window in their HUD appears showing both the remaining health of the building sapped and the health of the Sapper on that building.

Once the building is being sapped, the Engineer owner is alerted to it in his HUD, and automatically plays a voice clip alerting nearby players of the building's predicament. Engineers can remove a Sapper with two hits from their melee weapon (three with the Jag). When a Sapper is attacked, the Spy player is notified by a similar alert in their HUD. If an Engineer removes a Sapper from a Teleporter, the Sapper at the other end is also removed. If a Medic is healing the Engineer, he can get an assist for the Sapper kill. Pyros equipped with the Homewrecker or the Maul can destroy Sappers in one hit (two with the Neon Annihilator). Enemies focused on removing Sappers may leave themselves open to a backstab or headshot, allowing the Spy or a teammate to distract and dispose of enemies in addition to the building in question.

The Sapper has infinite ammunition and no discernible "cooldown" time; Sappers can be placed on a building faster than an Engineer can repair the damage each one causes, which guarantees the building's destruction if the Spy is not dealt with.

Sapped Sentry Guns take 33% less damage from the Spy who applied the Sapper, such as when shooting them with a Revolver. Dispensers and Teleporters take normal damage.

Damage and function times

See also: Damage
Damage and function times
Damage
Base damage 100% 25 / s
Function times
Recharge time
Normal:
N/A
MvM:
15 s
Building destroy time
Level 1:
6.00 s
Level 2:
7.20 s
Level 3:
8.64 s
Mini-Sentry:
4.00 s
Values are approximate and determined by community testing.

Demonstration

In Mann vs. Machine

In Mann vs. Machine, Sappers can be attached to robots, stunning them (and, if upgraded, any other robots nearby). Robots stunned this way can be backstabbed from any angle. Sappers do not damage robots - they only disable them for 4-7 seconds depending on how many Robot Sapper Power upgrades have been purchased. Giants, being immune to stun, are only slowed down and can still attack players. Sapping an Engineer Robot's buildings works as usual, however only one building can be sapped at a time.

Unlike regular multiplayer, sapping either a robot or a building requires the Sapper to recharge for 15 seconds before another one can be deployed.

The Sapper can be instantly recharged with a Ammo and Clip Refill canteen; however, if the Spy has placed a Sapper on a robot or building, he is unable to deploy it until the previous Sapper is no longer active (either all the objects it was applied to are destroyed or the effect time expires).

Sapper Power Upgrade Points Stun/Slowdown Duration Radius of Effect
0 4 s 0 HU
1 4 s 200 HU
2 5.5 s 225 HU
3 7 s 250 HU

Demonstration

Strange variant


Related achievements

Leaderboard class pyro.png Pyro

Firewall
 Firewall
Ignite 5 Spies who have a sapper on a friendly building.


Leaderboard class demoman.png Demoman

Spynal Tap
 Spynal Tap
Kill 20 Spies within 5 seconds of them sapping a friendly building.


Leaderboard class engineer.png Engineer

Fistful of Sappers
 Fistful of Sappers
Destroy 25 sappers on buildings built by other team members.


Get Along!
 Get Along!
Manage to get to, and then remove, a sapper placed on your building while you were several meters away.
Quick Draw
 Quick Draw
Kill a Spy and two sappers within 10 seconds.


Leaderboard class spy.png Spy

Joint Operation
 Joint Operation
Sap an enemy sentry gun within 3 seconds of a teammate sapping another.


Sap Auteur
 Sap Auteur
Destroy 1000 Engineer buildings with sappers.
Sapsucker
 Sapsucker
Sap an enemy building, then backstab the Engineer who built it within 5 seconds.


The Man with the Broken Guns
 The Man with the Broken Guns
Backstab an Engineer, then sap 3 of his buildings within 10 seconds.


Mvm navicon.png Mann vs. Machievements

Sly Voltage
 Sly Voltage
As a Spy, sap 10 robots at once.

Update history

October 2, 2007 Patch
  • Fixed server crash related to Spy Sappers.

November 7, 2007 Patch

  • Fixed Spies being able to attach Sappers through thin walls.

December 20, 2007 Patch

  • Sapped buildings now take slightly less damage from the Spy who sapped them.

March 1, 2008 Patch (Xbox)

  • Fixed exploit attaching Sappers to buildings through walls.

June 23, 2008 Patch

  • Fixed Sapper viewmodel animation popping.

June 8, 2009 Patch

  • Fixed Spies not being able to sap a building if an enemy player was colliding with the building.

August 13, 2009 Patch (Classless Update)

  • Sappers attached to a teleporter automatically place another Sapper on the other end of the teleporter, if it exists.

December 2, 2010 Patch

  • Fixed Spies being able to destroy Sappers by using the "destroy 3 0" command.

March 22, 2012 Patch

  • [Undocumented] Added Strange quality.
  • [Undocumented] Made the Sapper nameable.
  • [Undocumented] The Sapper now appears in backpack when viewing stock items.
  • [Undocumented] Fixed Sapper needle animation not properly playing.

August 2, 2012 Patch

  • Fixed Sappers attaching incorrectly to Teleporters that are still building.

February 14, 2013 Patch

  • Fixed "Buildings Sapped" strange counter sometimes incrementing when buildings were destroyed without a Sapper attached.

March 12, 2013 Patch

  • [Undocumented] Converted the Sapper and buildings to use c_sapper models.

March 19, 2013 Patch

  • Fixed the Spy not holding Sappers correctly in third person.

December 20, 2013 Patch (Smissmas 2013)

  • [Undocumented] Added Festive variant.

January 9, 2014 Patch

  • Fixed not being able to gift wrap the Festive Sapper.

July 17, 2014 Patch

  • Fixed the Festive Sapper not having a skin for the Blu team.

January 7, 2015 Patch

  • Updated the Vampire powerup to give health for damage done by Sappers.

July 2, 2015 Patch #1 (Gun Mettle Update)

  • Decreased the damage penalty on Sentry Guns sapped by the Spy from -66% to -33% (i.e. shooting a Sentry the Spy sapped with a Revolver is now more effective).

September 24, 2015 Patch

December 17, 2015 Patch (Tough Break Update)

  • After removing a Sapper from a Sentry Gun, there is now a 0.5s delay before the sentry is active again.

December 18, 2015 Patch

  • Fixed a bug where the Sapper preview would disable buildings when removed.

August 29, 2016 Patch

  • Fixed Sappers sometimes only being applied to one Engineer teleporter.

November 2, 2016 Patch

  • Sappers can no longer be used while a truce is active.

December 21, 2016 Patch (Smissmas 2016)

  • Fixed not being able to transfer Strange stats between versions of the Sapper.

September 23, 2019 Patch

  • Fixed the Festive Sapper not playing a timer sound while attached to buildings.

Unused content

  • The game files have referenced a taunt for the Sapper since the game's launch; however, the animation is not present in the Spy's animation set.

Bugs

  • If the Sapper is placed on a building as it upgrades to the next level, an additional Sapper can be placed on the building for a brief period of time. Doing so causes the second Sapper to disappear, and renders the first Sapper indestructible by melee attacks from both Engineers and Pyros equipped with the Homewrecker, Maul, or Neon Annihilator. Additionally, the sapped building functions as normal, albeit with draining health. Hauling the affected building corrects the problem.
  • The idle animation does not play during a replay, causing the needle to remain still.
  • Occasionally, if a Spy saps repeatedly one end of a Teleporter while an Engineer attempts to destroys the Sappers on the other end, the Sapper is removed from the Engineer's end and not from the Spy's end.
  • The Sappers and Sapper placement outlines on robots currently do not render, though the bomb carrier's objective border still draws around the invisible model.
  • No matter how many buildings the player has sapped, the HUD only shows one sapped building notification at a time.

Trivia

  • Sappers are considered by the game to be buildings with 100 health. As such, they are immune to critical hits (they are not destroyed in one hit by a single critical Wrench swing) and can be created with the build console command.
  • The Festive variant has a note on the right side in French roughly translating to "Merry Smissmas, my friend!".

Gallery

  • RED first-person view.

  • BLU first-person view.

  • Electro Sapper with its attachment wires.

  • Broken Electro Sapper (Gib).

  • RED Festive variant.

  • BLU Festive variant.

  • RED Festive variant with its attachment wires.

  • BLU Festive variant with its attachment wires.

  • The HUD image displayed when using the Sapper on a building. Displays Sapper health and building health.

  • A Robot Demoknight being sapped.

See also

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