Sniper is in this weird balance black hole where all his unlocks are theoretically balanced and fair on paper, but become either ass to use or ass to fight in game. You can barely tweak them without tipping too far towards one side. It’s honestly impressive.
@@TKsh1Jarate hilariously works better than razorback at countering spies most of the time... Spy is literally wet TP already and they give two extremely effective anti spy weapons to Sniper, He's the one whose only counters are Spies and other Snipers, most of the item other counters are just an annoyance to him at best... Yes, This is definitely perfectly balanced with no flaws whatsoever
@@AMP256 tbf spy in general needs some kind of buff but the bleeding edge of his potential scares people away from that possibility, albiet understandably I don't know what i'd change on spy but it's way too late for a fundamental class change like that to happen unless they decide to slightly bump up all of his non-instakill damage or something so I won't theorize too heavily (that being said giving spy like, +25 HP and possibly Cozy Camper regen by default would be an interesting experiment, making him that much more sustainable if he can stay alive behind enemy lines after a pick)
@@owenkjell i think it leads a bit to broken territory, i mean, is a easy to apply "pseudo buff banner", if you are by yourself and no bushwacka, yeah it doesn't help much since the minicrits only let you like, 3 hit a soldier, pyro and demo and i guess 2 melee a medic. But if you do it with your team around, whoever was coated is usually dead unless your team mate sucks
The fact that most people don't bring out an SMG until they can smell another player sweating really says a lot about how people THINK Sniper SHOULD be played, versus how you can actually play Sniper.
I think a big reason is that putting effort into sniping better makes you so much more effective as a class than putting the same amount of effort into a more well-balanced skill set. Instead of learning how to fight effectively in mid to close combat most snipers just try to avoid those situations as much as possible all together. Hell, snipers who actually want to play in midrange would rather use the huntsman anyways.
@lolzauros snipers a long range class in a close range game which isn't bad by its own like dahlsim from street fighter is balanced due to his lack of good close options but sniper has so many good close range options that honestly the only way to truly balance him is to have the HUNTSMAN as his stock primary and all other rifles remade into bows so he fits in with the rest
You make a compelling argument yes, but I got the Cozy Camper surgically attached to my secondary slot a few years ago, and it’s pretty hard to get it reversed
The SMG doing so much less damage than the Pistol could make sense if the SMG fires something like .22LR (a weak round commonly used for target shooting and pest control) and the Pistol is in a larger calibre (e.g. .45) than its 9mm basis would suggest (or possibly even if it is 9mm, since I'm not sure on the ballistics of 9mm compared to 22LR). Quite why Sniper would bring an SMG chambered in .22LR I have no idea, but maybe we can blame Mann Co for that.
The funny thing is that the Pistol design inspirations are less powerful calibers than the SMG, so it would make more sense for the SMG being more punchy.
It could also be that the SMG is built *really* shit. Completely smooth bore so it doesn't have any rifling ability, purely spraying lead. Other than that, dunno.
@@edg4rallanbro753 Considering the SMG is more accurate than the Pistol, it would be the other way around, with the SMG being a rifled barrel and the pistol being smooth bored
9:09 Something key that wasn't brought up, but is key to why this even happens: As it turns out, buildings are not affected by either damage rampup, or damage falloff. As a result, the base damage of a weapon will always take affect against Sentry guns, making rapid fire and precise weapons being generally effective for Sentry Busting, such as the SMG and Enforcer.
The revolvers in general are some of the best weapons that nobody uses on Sentries. You can be incredibly safe and take down a sentry from some incredibly dumb angle behind the enemy team and get away scot free
@@OmegaRC59 Enforcer sees a good use against The Wrangler in this case, which I like a lot. Love to absolutely shred a wrangled Mini Sentry. A little sad it doesn't pierce the damage reduction sentry guns get when being sapped.
@@SyRose901 Remember, the sapper armor is only reduces any damage the spy who placed the sapper deals to the sentry. So if you sap a sentry, and then your demo walks in and shoots the thing twice, the gun is still taking 200 damage.
It's weird. The SMG only has one function, yet it can be weaved in a million different applications. But the Jarate actually has about 4 distinct functions, yet it feels really one dimensional to use.
I always assumed the bloom would be too inaccurate to be faster than just using the rifle. I'm more familiar with the pistols so I had no idea it was that accurate.
1:50 In real life the "lethality per shot" of any given firearm is largely dependent on the round that it is chambered in. An SMG chambered in .22 long rifle would likely be significantly less lethal per shot than a handgun chambered in something like 9mm Parabellum. Both the TF2 pistol and SMG are fictional, but seem to be based on a Walther PPK mixed with a Makarov PM for the pistol and MAT-49 mixed with a Thompson, with some elements of the MP40 for the SMG. In that case, the pistols are chambered mostly in smaller cartridges than the SMGs, but not by a lot. "Realism" gets both unfairly praised and unfairly maligned in gaming IMO depending on who you talk to. But I think its generally fine here to not really allow realism to dictate damage values and let gameplay dominate that particular element.
The "lethality pershot" in real life is where the projectile lands. A clean shot with a weak cartridge deals infinitely more damage than a missed .50 BMG.
Being a stock weapon, the SMG was built around the previous TF games in terms of its function and balance. The Automatic Rifle of Quake TF and TFC behaves basically the same. I think the SMG (and most other stock weapons) is a testament to the creativity and gameplay and balance understanding of Robin Walker, John Cook and Ian Caughley. They knew what would be the optimal default secondary for the Sniper class even as far back as the first Quake Team Fortress mod release in 1996.
But they underestimated at the same time how many hours some players would put into a singular class 16 years later, which seems pretty damn obvious with Sniper imo.
I remember when I hit a head shot on a soilder who then pulled put the escape plan to try dodge a second rifle shot and it was working until I pulled out my smg which even at medium range still delt about 20 damage thanks to the mini crits, I love the smg.
1:21 The two guns are shooting different bullet calibers. My best guess is that the pistol shoots .45 ACP (the same ammo type used by the M1911 and Tommy gun), while the SMG chambers 9mm (the same ammo used by the Uzi family and most Glocks).
There is one situation where the Cleaner's Carbine shines: Tank shredding. In MvM, if you have the swing speed on the Bushwacka maxed out, then activate the "Crikey!" on the Carbine, you WILL get crits on the Bushwacka, which will do a ton of damage to the tank.
3:40 Pyro is so limited on range that he's moot. Vacc medics are best taken on with others, and a quick body isn't hard to land. Only 2 of those examples are actually a threat.
Nah I reckon it _was_ designed with stock's _charge meter_ in mind and not the fact some players would spend majority of their time in the game playing just Sniper and becoming gods of aim. I highly doubt back in 2007 that a Sniper being able to quickscope everyone in their sight would cross their minds for long enough. Feels kinda same as with Heavy's shotguns situation. Why would a heavy need a shotgun if his minigun is good in every situation nowadays. Same with a Sniper. Why would a Sniper need an SMG if his rifle works perfectly fine at all ranges? Prolly because both were designed with how long it could take to damage the enemy if caught off-guard. Heavy's spin-up for miniguns got buffed and Tomislav exists too, so Heavy's got barely any reason to use shotguns outside of Brass Beast and Huo Long Heater, his unlocks. Same with Sniper, I reckon back then they thought everyone would be charging and lining their shots from a far, but never thought about someone being able to quickscope someone in melee range consistently 16 years later. Again, leaving the SMG to be paired with some of the unlocks instead of the stock weapon.
It just feels bad and unsatisfying to use for many people when compared to what most people think of when they hear the term "SMG". Compared to that ideal there's a certain disappointment and helplessness that comes to be associated with the thing as a player begins to learn the game. Most people don't play Sniper enough to break out of it and some of those who try are still held back by it's bad feel and frustrating inaccuracy.
Similar to what the other person responded with, SMG's problem is primarily 'bad first impression' syndrome. It's simple to a fault, sounds piddly, low overall damage, and looks kinda ugly. Many snipers that are relatively fresh to the game probably haven't developed the game sense or tracking to get a lot of use out of it, so they'll opt for weirder/flashier secondaries that seem to produce more of an impact. By the time they're good or wise enough to use the weapon for it's strengths, they've either forgotten about it or have learned how to use the other secondaries well enough to willfully forgo using it.
@@vivelespatat2670 They work in conjunction with each other. Wound up close targets with the body-shot/quickscope attempt and clean up with the smg. It's easier/more consistent to clean up a kill with smg than to repeatedly try to shoot a close range target with your sniper rifle.
The Medic's Syringe gun is suprisingly powerful actually. The projectile aspect makes it awful for attacking, but if you can read the enemy and tell when they start to just run the med for a kill, you can pepper them with syringes reliably dealing a substantial amount of damage.
Only if u are good at reading people and patterns in certain maps, so u can land everything in an scout that's pursuing you inside an house in harvest for example, because using it like heavy is bound to be met with an rocket or sniper class quick scoping because it's an balanced class.
I wish the syringes at least got a projectile speed buff. It's impossible to read where your shots are going in the first place, making it very difficult to adjust your aim, but the slow travel speed makes it a pain to hit anything even at medium ranges.
I always thought that the Syringe Gun was made for selfdefense when you are walking backwards. It's a lot easier to aim those syringes when the enemy is walking into them coming for your ass
@@twicedeadmage Okay sure, tell that to the classes who do actually want to follow you that closely. Demoman and Scout will lmao you before any of your shots really get a chance of building up damage, which only really leaves Pyro, who will just go on burning down the teammates you abandoned to try and make your syringe gun even remotely useful.
1:39 Gun enthusiast here. Although it’s obviously not a comparable comparison, seeing as the stock pistol is of smaller caliber, any pistol that fires larger than 9mm would technically be more powerful than an smg of lower caliber. There are a modicum of sub machine guns made that are chambered in sub 9mm. but based on the assumption that both the sniper’s smg and the stock pistol fire 9mm, an smg of that barrel length would theoretically do more damage.
At least 7 times when I was floating a weapon idea, people kept negatively comparing it to jarate. In three of those ideas, people considered it an interesting sidegrade if jarate didn't exist. the problem with sniper secondaries is that people compare them to jarate, when they should be comparing it to stock.
1:50 the american 180 was a .22 long rifle SMG issued for police and riot control forces as a """less lethal""" weapon. the smallest magazine it had was 165 rounds and the biggest was 275. they genuinely gave riot police a .22 with 200 rounds with double the firerate of a full size UZI as their nonlethal weapon to deter civilians. because a single .22 would never kill a man unless they were very lucky. unfortunatley this concept didn't serve to be too effective for less lethal use, however at a closed range magdumping 20+ rounds of .22 really fast is fun as shit.
1:43 Alright so fun little fact: most SMGs (or PDWs) and pistols fire similar calibers, the two most common being 9MM and 45 ACP (MP5 + Glock 17, UMP 45 + M1911 respectively). Some others are the P90 and Five-Seven's 5.7x28mm rounds. Modern/Magnum revolvers alongside the Desert Eagle pistols also fire rounds that are large and to my knowledge no SMG as attempted. You can see with the SMG and the Pistol that the magazine for the Pistol is thicker than the SMG's, likely carrying larger styled rounds as a result, especially since there are less rounds in the Pistol than the SMG.
1:48 - the Vz.61 Skorpion is a czech PDW (compact smg) that fires 32 acp, a caliber often found in tiny pocket pistols from the early 1900s, while at the same time the czech military was using the Cz.52, a handgun chambered in 7.62 Tokarev, nearly twice more powerful (in regards to kinetic energy, velocity, penetration..)
I believe the reason the SMG is "underutilized" is because its most effective range, the "Danger Zone", will often be... deep inside your own team's territory Without damage falloff, the Sniper can be effective given any sufficiently open space, even standing inside his own spawn. The "Safe to Sniper" bar should be triple or even quintuple the lengths of the "Danger" and "Please God" zones, and that would better demonstrate the disparity of range-usefulness between the two weapons. Any enemies that are lucky/bold enough to get within that Danger Zone and still be alive are typically so few and so spread out, that a jar of Jarate can be given to each any every one of them, and they'll be finished off by other teammates who the Sniper will be surrounded by or by the Sniper himself via a mini-crit no-scope or the Bushwaka
1:42 I mean... ok; this might be classified as get-out-of-jail-free card but AM-180 chambered in .22 (smalest conventional ammo, usualy used in training/recreational) thing is with AM-180... is that it has a 177round pan mag... and 1200 RPM or y know 20 rounds a second
1:50 American 180 “the swarm of angry bees” is a sub machine gun shooting .22 long rifle rounds at an insanely high rate of fire to compensate for tiny boolet Compare that to any pistol using a bullet bigger than .22 long rifle like a Glock or a 1911 and you got your answer
1:40 I don't think you need to be a gun expert to know that different calibers exist and that getting shot with any of them will lead to you dying without medical assistance. That's kinda the point of a gun.
There is an smg that is shot for shot half as powerful than your average pistol, it's called the American 180. The American 180 is an smg chambered in 22lr with a top loading disc mag, it's modeled (visually) after the Thompson smg but functions like the dp28 which is a WW2 lmg. And 22lr is a much weaker round than your average 9mm, 45acp, or hell even a 5.7mm, so yeah there's an smg like what you said.
@@hilltopy As a man of (gun) culture like myself, of course I know of the gun that shoots bees. It is a must know for any gun nerd, along with correcting people on the terminology of mags and clips.
It's so obvious the SMG is based off the American 180. How no one else sees the resemblance is crazy. Thank you for explaining that lore to us, you are very smart and knowledgeable about guns and totally don't just watch a bunch of youtube videos. It's a fucking game, my guy. It isn't trying to be realistic neither.
“I’d love to hear about a sub machine gun that made it out of the factory being less lethal than a handgun” The problem with this question is that submachine guns and handguns are a very broad and diverse *categories* of guns, a firearm’s stopping power depends on what cartridge it fires and its barrel length A .50 Action Express out of a handgun would do much more damage than a 9 millimeter out of a carbine. We don’t know what specific cartridge the Sniper’s SMG or the pistol fires, but if we were to assume they were both in the same caliber then yes the SMG would have better stopping power, accuracy and muzzle velocity from its longer barrel.
11:49 if you talking same caliber no. but there are many SMGs with lower cartridges than certain pistols. what would determines the wound capabulity of a weapon is not just ammo but barrel length. a longer barrel makes the bullet have a longer time to acquire speed and a faster projectile can penetrate more.
I want to say you do a great job at this. You present things well, even for people who don't play the game (me), you present things fairly and entertainingly, and you have a good grasp on the actual workings of the game (as opposed to people who have a thousand hours of pro play and entirely incomprehensible balance ideas). The only thing more I could ask for is people like you for other games. This kind of in-depth mechanical analysis is too rare by half.
1:45 The American 180 is an SMG that fires .22lr at a very high rate. It was intended to prevent overpenetration of walls or vehicles while still being lethal. Another example that comes to mind is the VZ.61 "scorpion," which fires .32acp. Both of these are weaker shot-for-shot than a standard 9mm handgun.
Hey fish! Im a gunsmith and machinist and your question about the SMG vs handgun lethality actually has a pretty nuanced secondary question; what cartridge is each weapon chambered in? Say the SMG was chambered in the anemic .380 and the pistol was chambered in 10mm, the pistol would be nearly twice as dangerous. Examples of firearms that are chambered in .380 arent scarce either, however, the general dynamic of firearms is always going to end up being "nobody wants to be shot, doesnt matter what with" a .22 can put someone out of fighting shape in the right circumstance.
It's definitely not situational if you don't have perfect aim as Sniper. If you have perfect aim, there never is any reason to use the SMG outside of the Huntsman and Sydney Sleeper, why waste time dealing miniscule damage if you can land two 150 damage shots.
I've noticed that the smg is unironically one of the best weapons for crit servers. It's high accuracy, magazine size, and fire rate all work together to turn this once puny weapon into a menace to fight against
1:48 you can argue the sten/owen gun vs. The standard issue m1911 has this same dynamic but thats because the sten gun is basically a pipe with bullets shoved in it
Smgs are defined usually by the fact that they fire handgun rounds (as well as all the other things that make them machine guns). There are some exceptions, like the MP7 which fires essentially a half handgun half rifle round. But for the most part, you can assume that a given SMG fires a handgun round. This means that, yes, a handgun CAN be shot for shot more powerful than an SMG, if the handgun's caliber and/or powdercharge is greater. An SMG that fires 9mm will be significantly less powerful shot for shot than a handgun that fires .45cal. The SMG's advantage over handguns is of course the fully auto, as well as *SLIGHTLY* increased accuracy for both the projectile and the wielder. The tradeoff for this overall advantage however is that you have something the size of a small rifle that fires something that has wayyy less penetration than a rifle, due to firing handgun rounds which are often not designed for penetration but rather just raw stopping force.
Not an expert, but as a person who knows stuff about guns, it's entirely possible for an SMG to be less lethal per shot than a pistol. Both SMGs and Pistols use pistol rounds. The difference being that an SMG will mostly be chambered in either 9mm, .45 ACP, 5.7mm, or 10mm. But pistols can be chambered in basically any pistol caliber that isn't .500 magnum, which is barely a pistol caliber. Meaning that they could be chambered in .357 Magnum, .44 Magnum, or even .50 AE. It's why a Desert Eagle does more damage than an MP5 in most games, because the Desert Eagle is in a much higher caliber.
1:50 The “American 180” comes to my mind immediately, a submachine gun that fires .22lr. While common pistols are usually chambered in the larger/faster 9mm or .45, I don’t think anyone would wanna be shot at with 165 rounds of .22lr at 1200 rounds per min
you make a good point, however the mini-crits of the jarate or hell, even the carbine is WAY too good for me to pass up but I ignore my rifle and use the bushwaka as a primary so maybe there's a little bias idk
Not a gun "expert", but I do enjoy gun knowledge casually. Generally speaking, submachine guns are technically "larger handguns" that use the same bullets that most normal handguns use, just that SMGs are on average slightly larger in order to gain the ability to rapidly spit out a bunch of bullets for more damage, more magazine than a standard pistol, and better handling, without having as much physical bulk or firepower (bigger ammunition sizes cost more per bullet) as a full-sized assault rifle or a machine gun. The true power of an SMG IRL is the ability to spit out more bullets with much less effort than a normal handgun while using the same ammunition (usually). That being said, there are a bunch of bullet sizes/calibers, so it isn't unheard of for an SMG per shot to be weaker than a handgun, assuming you find the right comparisons. For an example, I don't think anyone who has seen a Desert Eagle (handgun) chambered for .50 Action Express can say that a single a 9mm from an H&K UMP9 (submachine gun) can outperform it *per bullet*. For an even stupider yet legendary example of pistols with massive calibers (but this time going into non-mass-produced guns), the mythical Triple Action Thunder is a breech-loaded single shot pistol chambered for .50 BMG, which is *a fucking massive machine gun caliber that is 5.45 inches long before being fired!*
A low caliber SMG “dealing less damage” than a higher caliber handgun makes sense. The desert Eagle will hurt you a lot more than a 10 mm from a Mac-10
I think the issue is that since you can still headshot people at mid range most snipers probably see the smg as a last resort/crutch for sucking at quickscopes.Engie and scout both use it for mid range because it has better dps than their shotguns at that range while the snipers primary is always his best weapon if you can aim it well enough.TLDR limit snipers range not to headshot when an enemy gets close enough.It would both give a reason to use the smg and make the fight against a good sniper significantly less one sided by putting him at a mechanical disadvantage when at close range rather than a skillful disadvantage(if that makes sense)
1:50 I mean.. most of them. In the modern era, anyway. Handguns tend to have higher calibers than SMGs, since they're designed to fire a large cartridge that does a decent amount of damage, whereas SMGs tend to use lower caliber rounds for faster firing speed and post-pen damage.
1:40 ...I mean... that's entirely down to a difference in ammunition. The American 180 for example, which uses (a LOT of) 22 LR is going to have less per shot stopping power when compared to most handguns that use anything bigger than 22 LR, such as a USP chambered in .45 ACP.
1:40 It's normal for an SMG to fire weaker ammo than a pistol. The M1911, one of the most popular pistols in the world, typically fires .45 ACP or 10mm Auto. Many SMGs, such as the the American 180, fire ammo as weak as 22lr, which is about half as powerful as .45 ACP & 10mm Auto. Of course, the 180 is the more lethal gun, with its 1200 round/min fire rate. But you did say "shot for shot". The Tommy Gun fires .45 APC, same as the M1911. The Tommy Gun is one of the more powerful SMGs. I'm far from a gun expert. This is just stuff I picked up from watching channels like Forgotten Weapons and hickok45.
For a given definition of 'leaving the factory half as lethal as a handgun', there ARE submachine guns in some very anemic calibers (like .32 ACP or .22 long rifle) that do make them incredibly weak compared to period handguns (even 9x19mm, let alone .45 ACP). However, submachine guns use anemic calibers because the country making them is either fitting a niche (you need a very, very tiny submachine gun and the cartridge is a concession to fit the niche since a bigger caliber makes the gun itself too big to be useful in a given role), or typically the country is just using an anemic caliber for its pistols and doesn't want to introduce a new caliber for the submachine gun. So, if we assume the SMG is in .32 ACP and the Pistol is - in spite of all looks - in a hotter, heavier cartridge like 7.62x25mm Tokarev or 9x19mm (or some special sauce, secret squirrel Mann Co. Original wildcat cartridge), you CAN, theoretically, find a specific combination of cartridges to find a Submachine gun with individual rounds "half as lethal" as a handgun. I wouldn't entirely put it past Saxton Hale to deliberately manufacture SMGs in weaker calibers specifically in an attempt to screw over sniper teams, vehicle crews, and paratroopers that aren't Soldier, since I suspect those are military roles Hale considers 'cowardly'. What kind of man lets a tank do all the fighting?
Okay you’re right the lower damage per shot seems kinda silly but hear me out the original Škorpion vz 61 was an SMG designed as a sidearm for drivers and tank crews, a weapon of last resort. It *vomits* 32 ACP which is about as low-power as pistol rounds get before being more of a joke. The advantage is because 32 ACP is very lightweight and compact compared to say 9mm Makarov (or worse, 7.62 Tokarev which is like a long 9mm case necked down to .30) you can carry more and have a smaller gun, and the lower recoil means your crazy gun that spits bullets is a little easier to use.
I've always wanted to find a use for the SMG but never really found one as I (foolishly) kept using it for Spray-n-Prey, the mention of using it as a finisher just clicks in my brain, I'm trying it out next time I boot up the game.
Gun expert here. Uuuuh... it depends on the caliber. If the handguns are using .45 ACP and the SMG is using 9mm, then yes. The damage discrepancies would make sense. But if they're using the same caliber, then no. And it wouldn't even be a contest, as an SMG still has a longer barrel, ergo, more velocity when exiting the barrel. Unless the SMG is shooting 22. LR, then it's not going to have that much of a difference in damage.
Fun Fact: In the Tf2 comics when the robots attack the mercs and they are given guns. The boxes say Submachine Guns, implying it’s a box full of Sniper SMGs.
1:40 Perhaps the SMG uses a smaller caliber of bullet, hence the damage being weaker. However if you try to compare the guns to similar real life comparisons they should use the same or a similar caliber. The Pistol looks to resemble a Walther PPK which was chambered up to 9MM, and Sniper's SMG looks to resemble a Mauser C96 which was also chambered in 9MM. I'd like to think that Sniper's SMG is chambered in something like 22LR hence the low recoil and ability to track your shots well, while the Pistol is chambered in .380 ACP or 9MM.
gun nerd here the stock pistol seems to be loosely based on a Colt 1911 handgun, which is chambered in the .45 ACP round, so we can assume that it uses this caliber. meanwhile, the smg is supposedly based on a mat-49 aubmachine gun, which is in 9mm. tl;dr pistol is .45 acp smg is 9mm .45 > 9mm pistol does more per-shot damage
1:45 the pistol is a .32 cal from what i figure, and i think the SMG is probably either a .22 Long rifle or a .22 centerfire, the second being known to be pretty shit at killing things, and considering the lack of recoil i'd say its one of the 2.
1:50 The American 180, an SMG designed for use by law enforcement. It uses a drum of 180 rounds of .22 long rifle, which per round is ballistically quite pitiful when compared to the likes of 9x19. It makes up for this with a blisteringly high fire rate of 1200 rounds per minute. This post brought to you by the obnoxious gun pedants that proliferate UA-cam comments.
So fish with the entire smg that’s less damaging than a pistol it’s hard to say since well there’s the side of the bullets, the powder load behind them, lots of factors to consider(for example I think a .500 s&w from a revolver is gonna deal more damage than a 9mm out of an smg) but more to your point, if an smg had a really small barrel and the pistol had a longer barrel than it both days firing 9mm, then theoretically the pistol would be more damaging because it has more velocity to it.
I guess the HK VP70(M) with its stupid 3 round burst stock could be counted as a submachine gun if you stretch the definition. That gun runs on a gas delayed blowback mechanism which means gasses pass by the bullet and slip into the very deeply cut rifling of the barrel jetting forward in order to delay the opening of the action. That unfortunately also means half the gas blows past the bullet making it weaker than any other 9mm pistol around.
Actually, there is a good reason for a pistol to do more damage per shot than an equivalent SMG. Of all guns in a given caliber, SMGs tend to have the worst muzzle energy, due to short barrels and the commonly used blowback operation which wastes energy. Pistols usually use the more efficient inertia operation which retains pressure and spits the bullet out faster. Short pistols can have longer barrels than some SMGs due to it extending further back, which also improves energy and therefore damage. There's also no reason to assume the SMG and pistol take the same ammo, and even if they are the pistol could be running a higher pressure load in that caliber. But at the end of the day this is a game where a fat guy eating a sandwich can just shrug off getting repeatedly shot with a comically unrealistic rocket launcher so maybe we just shouldn't look too far into it.
the only smg I could think of besides some homemade abomination that'd have less terminal impact than a pistol of the same caliber is probably the mp5 ssd because of it's ported barrel it reduces the velocity of standard 9mm ammo to below the speed of sound so that it can make as little noise as possible when suppressed without needing to source different ammo which in a military application would be impractical
The only real-world gun I can think of that would be considered weaker than an average pistol per shot would be the American 180, a .22 caliber submachinegun with a drum style magazine with 100+ round capacity. It's not that it was weaker than another gun in .22, but given many handguns are chambered in .45, 9mm, or .32, it could be said to be weaker per shot. It does shread soft body armor though, as there's practically no felt recoil meaning you can just find a spot on their armor, shoot at it, and effectively drill through the armor with its insane fire rate.
Frankly, I still just don't get the use case for the Sydney Sleeper. Some people claim the support is nice, but really, how does that apply when the Stock Rifle can score a kill in any given situation, or at least leave the target on basically no health? A straight-up insta-kill is arguably better support than making someone more vulnerable to damage. I can see it sort of make sence in MvM where targets have too much health to be one-shot with stock, and it did make sense with one of the older Sleeper iterations where you'd get a Jarate AoE on charged headshots, allowing you to grant your golden shower to multible enemies, but "I made this enemy easier to kill" is never gonna be as much value as "I killed that enemy"
From the stats the damage reason is likely that the pistol is a higher caliber than the SMG, but Valve is also Valve and I don’t know if I should get into valve guns in a game where everyone says clip about magazine size despite not a single weapon being loaded with stripper clips.
so the thing with firearms is that when you put, say, a 9mm cartridge into a pistol, and you put that same cartridge into a submachine gun, while there are some changes to terminal ballistics? They're both going to do roughly the same amount of damage, at least at close range. It has nothing to do with the construction of the weapon. There's a bit of an asterisk here in regards to barrel length (longer means faster bullet means more energy), but it isn't going to be so drastic that it would be 'twice as lethal'- and in any case the SMG should win there.
I actually unironically prefer the carbine over the SMG, but only when I'm using the huntsman. If I hit my arrows, the pittance of damage the Carbine deals doesn't matter. And whenever I get a full Crikey meter, I have a legal obligation to instantly die to a random crit which is always super fun!
In the first few seconds, my mind immediately jumped to him saying "Videos like these are made possible by viewers like you, thank you" just like how I'd hear it all the time growing up on... PBS was it?
I like the SMG so much that I keep suggesting that it should also be available as a Scout Primary. I love the Shortstop, and the Pepperboy subclass as a whole a lot...but I can just imagine the sweet life that would be the sustained fire of the nailgun from the TF2 beta, with none of the "projectiles" to worry about. Scout rambles aside...the SMG is by far my favorite Sniper secondary. My favorite Sniper primary is the Huntsman, which does partially explain this fact, but the sheer number of Scouts who see a Sniper and say "them's easy pickins" only to get volley'ed into the dirt by an SMG...I have easily twice as many scout kills with SMGs as I do with Sniper Primaries. The SMG is also much better for dealing with Spies than the Razorback assuming you actually have a brain that is capable of situational awareness.
Why is everyone dissing the Carbine ? In my eyes and experience (and apparently the competitive scene's eyes, seeing how it's banned), it's basically a straight upgrade. While the slower firing rate is noticeable, it actually helps a lot with tracking without noticeably impacting the DPS. And trust me, the 5 less bullets per clip are a completely forgettable "downside". Most of the time, you won't notice, trust me. But the kicker is the Crikey meter. Paired with either the bushwacka or used on the Carbine itself, it lets you go on some nasty rampage without the announcement that the Jarate provides to the enemy. It pairs nicely with the primary in its set : the Heatmaker. Only three Bushwacka kills, and you have full Focus meter. And just like the SMG, it covers the weakness of lower bodyshot damage well, which gives you more opportunity to grind the 100 damage requirement. Especialy on buildings.
1:42 "I'd love to hear about any SMG that made it out of the factory being half as lethal as any given handgun shot." Valve is a repeat offender with this. Both of Half-Life 1's and 2's SMGs deal less damage per bullet than their respective pistols. 5 vs. 8 in HL1, 4 vs. 5 in HL2. Yes, they nerfed two already weak weapons in the sequel.
I’ve said to many people over the years that the SMG is secretly a really great gun; also fun fact, the first bullet shot always has 0 spread, it’s clearly intended to be a follow up weapon when you look at it like that.
That was a change made after the game was released (and also applies to every bullet gun except the minigun - pistol, SMG, shotgun, revolver. All 4 fire the first bullet - or first pellet for the shotgun - with 0 spread).
1:46 SMG simply would have a smaller caliber, per the time period and looking at the mag dimensions id say the pistol is .45 while the SMG would be 9mm or .22 or 7.62x25mm as they are smaller but still used in real life SMG‘s, the SMG is based off the Mauser c96 m217 which is a full auto 7.62 x25mm mauser SMG (machine pistol really, which means it would technically do less damage than a .45 as the bullet is smaller but size isn’t everything as per ballistics the mauser has better penetration if armor is involved but if not (bulletproof vests weren’t invented until 1975, the game takes place in 1968/1971[mvm]) the larger size of the .45 (pistol) would bore a larger hole in the target due to its diameter therefore causing more damage, so the game is accurate in this case to real life (mostly)
![[TF2] The Huntsman VS The Sniper Rifle - A Balance Discussion](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/vQdbmPC-jbE/mqdefault.jpg)
![[TF2] The Huntsman VS The Sniper Rifle - A Balance Discussion](/img/tr.png)
![[TF2] The Power of the Pistol](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/JwKdPJ-0XlY/mqdefault.jpg)
![[TF2] Weapon Stereotypes! Episode 9: The Sniper](/img/n.gif)
I love that Fish has evolved from Bad Weapon Academy to just Weapon Academy.
wen gud wepn acadmy?
How much weapons do you think tf2 has
@@EthVortexShield 4
At least 7
Hardly more than 9
Sniper is in this weird balance black hole where all his unlocks are theoretically balanced and fair on paper, but become either ass to use or ass to fight in game. You can barely tweak them without tipping too far towards one side. It’s honestly impressive.
Jarate basically gives you a free crit and powerful counter against Spy, that's how balanced it is.
@@TKsh1Jarate hilariously works better than razorback at countering spies most of the time...
Spy is literally wet TP already and they give two extremely effective anti spy weapons to Sniper,
He's the one whose only counters are Spies and other Snipers, most of the item other counters are just an annoyance to him at best...
Yes, This is definitely perfectly balanced with no flaws whatsoever
@@TKsh1 on its own it's annoying but not super unfair, bushwacka is what makes it stupidly broken
@@AMP256 tbf spy in general needs some kind of buff but the bleeding edge of his potential scares people away from that possibility, albiet understandably
I don't know what i'd change on spy but it's way too late for a fundamental class change like that to happen unless they decide to slightly bump up all of his non-instakill damage or something so I won't theorize too heavily
(that being said giving spy like, +25 HP and possibly Cozy Camper regen by default would be an interesting experiment, making him that much more sustainable if he can stay alive behind enemy lines after a pick)
@@owenkjell i think it leads a bit to broken territory, i mean, is a easy to apply "pseudo buff banner", if you are by yourself and no bushwacka, yeah it doesn't help much since the minicrits only let you like, 3 hit a soldier, pyro and demo and i guess 2 melee a medic.
But if you do it with your team around, whoever was coated is usually dead unless your team mate sucks
The fact that most people don't bring out an SMG until they can smell another player sweating really says a lot about how people THINK Sniper SHOULD be played, versus how you can actually play Sniper.
“He has no style, he has no grace. This Sniper main, has a SMG”
I think a big reason is that putting effort into sniping better makes you so much more effective as a class than putting the same amount of effort into a more well-balanced skill set. Instead of learning how to fight effectively in mid to close combat most snipers just try to avoid those situations as much as possible all together. Hell, snipers who actually want to play in midrange would rather use the huntsman anyways.
@lolzauros snipers a long range class in a close range game which isn't bad by its own like dahlsim from street fighter is balanced due to his lack of good close options but sniper has so many good close range options that honestly the only way to truly balance him is to have the HUNTSMAN as his stock primary and all other rifles remade into bows so he fits in with the rest
@@getaround1276 ok cool now hes buggy and one shots everyone around corners
@@yeetandyum3709 Huntsman, SMG, and stock kukiri.
It's actually really good.
You make a compelling argument yes, but I got the Cozy Camper surgically attached to my secondary slot a few years ago, and it’s pretty hard to get it reversed
Hp number go up despite being invisible to medics it’s why I like the conch
The only good backpack
For real. I miss when it was flinchless without full charge and pre healing rampup.
Same here, it's just too good
Nah, a jar of piss and a cs2 knife is my go to.
The SMG doing so much less damage than the Pistol could make sense if the SMG fires something like .22LR (a weak round commonly used for target shooting and pest control) and the Pistol is in a larger calibre (e.g. .45) than its 9mm basis would suggest (or possibly even if it is 9mm, since I'm not sure on the ballistics of 9mm compared to 22LR). Quite why Sniper would bring an SMG chambered in .22LR I have no idea, but maybe we can blame Mann Co for that.
The funny thing is that the Pistol design inspirations are less powerful calibers than the SMG, so it would make more sense for the SMG being more punchy.
It could also be that the SMG is built *really* shit. Completely smooth bore so it doesn't have any rifling ability, purely spraying lead. Other than that, dunno.
@@edg4rallanbro753
That might be canon
Didn't the comics say that the Mann Co shovel is so poorly designed that it randomly combusts?
@@edg4rallanbro753 Considering the SMG is more accurate than the Pistol, it would be the other way around, with the SMG being a rifled barrel and the pistol being smooth bored
@@thebigcheeze6430 >Pistol fires a .75 caliber, 600 grain lead ball at subsonic speeds
9:09
Something key that wasn't brought up, but is key to why this even happens:
As it turns out, buildings are not affected by either damage rampup, or damage falloff.
As a result, the base damage of a weapon will always take affect against Sentry guns, making rapid fire and precise weapons being generally effective for Sentry Busting, such as the SMG and Enforcer.
The revolvers in general are some of the best weapons that nobody uses on Sentries. You can be incredibly safe and take down a sentry from some incredibly dumb angle behind the enemy team and get away scot free
Also a Machina's full charge shot + 1 follow-up shot CAN kill a Level 3 Sentry Gun.
@@OmegaRC59 Enforcer sees a good use against The Wrangler in this case, which I like a lot. Love to absolutely shred a wrangled Mini Sentry. A little sad it doesn't pierce the damage reduction sentry guns get when being sapped.
@@SyRose901
Remember, the sapper armor is only reduces any damage the spy who placed the sapper deals to the sentry.
So if you sap a sentry, and then your demo walks in and shoots the thing twice, the gun is still taking 200 damage.
And since the enforcer ignores the wrangler, you get to deal full damage to the gun while the engie can only heal it for a reduced amount!
5:08 "Remember switching to your SMG is faster than re-aiming"
It's weird. The SMG only has one function, yet it can be weaved in a million different applications. But the Jarate actually has about 4 distinct functions, yet it feels really one dimensional to use.
I recommend using the bushwacka with it since the bushwacka full crits when it should mini crit
@@Randomdudewhoexists oh wow i never thought of that before, i bet it will be really funny
I guess that's sort of why I don't use the Jarate-Bushwacka combo out of principle, especially given how busted Jarate genuinely is.
I had fun throwing Jarate around. Very useful when annoying pyros just burns everyone in your team up.
@@StilvurBee This could lead to a whole new subclass, sniper knight!
Damn, that strategy of volleying after doing 150 damage to a building is so damn obvious, yet I never gave it a shot. Thank you!
Ironically I did that in game while listening to this video
“Gave it a shot”. 😂
Well, now you will give them multiple shots!
I always assumed the bloom would be too inaccurate to be faster than just using the rifle. I'm more familiar with the pistols so I had no idea it was that accurate.
Please let "Skinny Heavy" become a real meme subclass
It's already a thing
Just pocket a battle blusaguer/stock medic
Skivvie?
Heavy skinny? Skivvy? …Hinny?
1:50 In real life the "lethality per shot" of any given firearm is largely dependent on the round that it is chambered in. An SMG chambered in .22 long rifle would likely be significantly less lethal per shot than a handgun chambered in something like 9mm Parabellum.
Both the TF2 pistol and SMG are fictional, but seem to be based on a Walther PPK mixed with a Makarov PM for the pistol and MAT-49 mixed with a Thompson, with some elements of the MP40 for the SMG. In that case, the pistols are chambered mostly in smaller cartridges than the SMGs, but not by a lot. "Realism" gets both unfairly praised and unfairly maligned in gaming IMO depending on who you talk to. But I think its generally fine here to not really allow realism to dictate damage values and let gameplay dominate that particular element.
The "lethality pershot" in real life is where the projectile lands. A clean shot with a weak cartridge deals infinitely more damage than a missed .50 BMG.
@@Kagawwy That is true, but irrelevant to the point of weapon damage in TF2...
@@Kagawwy YA DON'T SAY?
brother said a whole lotta nothin
Heeeeeeeyyyyy! I use that profile pic too! 😊
So crazy tf2 came out in like 1864 and is still popular. It's genuinely surreal
Lmao I remember in 1878 those overwatch ruffians said the game would die. Theirs didn't even last 30 years.
I know someone is gonna comment "no it came out in 2007"
@@AsexMedic No, that'd be dumb because TF2 came out in 1864.
Being a stock weapon, the SMG was built around the previous TF games in terms of its function and balance. The Automatic Rifle of Quake TF and TFC behaves basically the same. I think the SMG (and most other stock weapons) is a testament to the creativity and gameplay and balance understanding of Robin Walker, John Cook and Ian Caughley. They knew what would be the optimal default secondary for the Sniper class even as far back as the first Quake Team Fortress mod release in 1996.
But they underestimated at the same time how many hours some players would put into a singular class 16 years later, which seems pretty damn obvious with Sniper imo.
I don't think anyone expected people to still play the game 16 years ago, let alone be nearing the height of its playerbase.
I remember when I hit a head shot on a soilder who then pulled put the escape plan to try dodge a second rifle shot and it was working until I pulled out my smg which even at medium range still delt about 20 damage thanks to the mini crits, I love the smg.
The existence of submachine guns implies the existence of dommachine guns.
That's just heavy machine guns, hence why the p90 is the bottom of guns
@Bagoof agoof
What would that make autocannons?
@@gingermcgingin4106 sadistmachineguns
We call those LMGs and GPMGs
"crazy with them choppas" - I really doubt many people today know where that's from.
Nice reference!
1:21 The two guns are shooting different bullet calibers. My best guess is that the pistol shoots .45 ACP (the same ammo type used by the M1911 and Tommy gun), while the SMG chambers 9mm (the same ammo used by the Uzi family and most Glocks).
There is one situation where the Cleaner's Carbine shines:
Tank shredding. In MvM, if you have the swing speed on the Bushwacka maxed out, then activate the "Crikey!" on the Carbine, you WILL get crits on the Bushwacka, which will do a ton of damage to the tank.
I highly recommend using the bushwacka with jarate since jarate is a faster option and you get the free crit wayyyy faster (outside of mvm)
Yeah, he made a full video on the matter
@@RandomdudewhoexistsHey numbnuts, ever consider NOT going for the bullshit option?
@@Randomdudewhoexists
thats more like wayyyyyyy slower than just grinding them with another fully charged crikey meter seconds after the previous one
Yeah but that implies paying mvm and literally who does that LMAO
3:40 Pyro is so limited on range that he's moot. Vacc medics are best taken on with others, and a quick body isn't hard to land. Only 2 of those examples are actually a threat.
The funny thing about the SMG is that it works better with every primary except for stock, the weapon it was designed with in mind.
And with Bazaar you're oughting for more survivability with the backpacks as well.
Nah I reckon it _was_ designed with stock's _charge meter_ in mind and not the fact some players would spend majority of their time in the game playing just Sniper and becoming gods of aim.
I highly doubt back in 2007 that a Sniper being able to quickscope everyone in their sight would cross their minds for long enough.
Feels kinda same as with Heavy's shotguns situation. Why would a heavy need a shotgun if his minigun is good in every situation nowadays.
Same with a Sniper. Why would a Sniper need an SMG if his rifle works perfectly fine at all ranges?
Prolly because both were designed with how long it could take to damage the enemy if caught off-guard. Heavy's spin-up for miniguns got buffed and Tomislav exists too, so Heavy's got barely any reason to use shotguns outside of Brass Beast and Huo Long Heater, his unlocks.
Same with Sniper, I reckon back then they thought everyone would be charging and lining their shots from a far, but never thought about someone being able to quickscope someone in melee range consistently 16 years later. Again, leaving the SMG to be paired with some of the unlocks instead of the stock weapon.
Smg the best, just aimbot and force crits with it LOL EZ!
@@zerefoex back to 2008 plis
@@simplysmiley4670 you forget that you’re presenting logic to internet users, who set of which avoid such a thing
I dunno why folks are sleeping on the SMGs. Perhaps it’s because of the fair and balanced Jarate Bushwacka combo is overshadowing it.
It just feels bad and unsatisfying to use for many people when compared to what most people think of when they hear the term "SMG". Compared to that ideal there's a certain disappointment and helplessness that comes to be associated with the thing as a player begins to learn the game. Most people don't play Sniper enough to break out of it and some of those who try are still held back by it's bad feel and frustrating inaccuracy.
Similar to what the other person responded with, SMG's problem is primarily 'bad first impression' syndrome. It's simple to a fault, sounds piddly, low overall damage, and looks kinda ugly. Many snipers that are relatively fresh to the game probably haven't developed the game sense or tracking to get a lot of use out of it, so they'll opt for weirder/flashier secondaries that seem to produce more of an impact.
By the time they're good or wise enough to use the weapon for it's strengths, they've either forgotten about it or have learned how to use the other secondaries well enough to willfully forgo using it.
Why bother shooting people with a pea shooter when you can instakill them with your PRIMARY ?
@@vivelespatat2670 They work in conjunction with each other. Wound up close targets with the body-shot/quickscope attempt and clean up with the smg.
It's easier/more consistent to clean up a kill with smg than to repeatedly try to shoot a close range target with your sniper rifle.
@@LL-kv1jkif you told me it does 300dmg a mag I would've said you're lying . Hits harder than it feels like it does
The Medic's Syringe gun is suprisingly powerful actually.
The projectile aspect makes it awful for attacking, but if you can read the enemy and tell when they start to just run the med for a kill, you can pepper them with syringes reliably dealing a substantial amount of damage.
Only if u are good at reading people and patterns in certain maps, so u can land everything in an scout that's pursuing you inside an house in harvest for example, because using it like heavy is bound to be met with an rocket or sniper class quick scoping because it's an balanced class.
I wish the syringes at least got a projectile speed buff. It's impossible to read where your shots are going in the first place, making it very difficult to adjust your aim, but the slow travel speed makes it a pain to hit anything even at medium ranges.
I always thought that the Syringe Gun was made for selfdefense when you are walking backwards. It's a lot easier to aim those syringes when the enemy is walking into them coming for your ass
@@twicedeadmage Okay sure, tell that to the classes who do actually want to follow you that closely. Demoman and Scout will lmao you before any of your shots really get a chance of building up damage, which only really leaves Pyro, who will just go on burning down the teammates you abandoned to try and make your syringe gun even remotely useful.
@@SethAbercromby I said that is made to work in that way, not that it worked that way. Crossbow beats all Syringe Guns by a mile.
1:39 Gun enthusiast here. Although it’s obviously not a comparable comparison, seeing as the stock pistol is of smaller caliber, any pistol that fires larger than 9mm would technically be more powerful than an smg of lower caliber. There are a modicum of sub machine guns made that are chambered in sub 9mm. but based on the assumption that both the sniper’s smg and the stock pistol fire 9mm, an smg of that barrel length would theoretically do more damage.
At least 7 times when I was floating a weapon idea, people kept negatively comparing it to jarate. In three of those ideas, people considered it an interesting sidegrade if jarate didn't exist. the problem with sniper secondaries is that people compare them to jarate, when they should be comparing it to stock.
This isn’t just a thing with sniper, it’s also a thing with medic.
1:50 the american 180 was a .22 long rifle SMG issued for police and riot control forces as a """less lethal""" weapon. the smallest magazine it had was 165 rounds and the biggest was 275. they genuinely gave riot police a .22 with 200 rounds with double the firerate of a full size UZI as their nonlethal weapon to deter civilians. because a single .22 would never kill a man unless they were very lucky. unfortunatley this concept didn't serve to be too effective for less lethal use, however at a closed range magdumping 20+ rounds of .22 really fast is fun as shit.
11:38 Oh so that was that invisible spy clip you were talking about Mr. Cheater Cheater Crumpkin eater
1:43 Alright so fun little fact: most SMGs (or PDWs) and pistols fire similar calibers, the two most common being 9MM and 45 ACP (MP5 + Glock 17, UMP 45 + M1911 respectively). Some others are the P90 and Five-Seven's 5.7x28mm rounds. Modern/Magnum revolvers alongside the Desert Eagle pistols also fire rounds that are large and to my knowledge no SMG as attempted. You can see with the SMG and the Pistol that the magazine for the Pistol is thicker than the SMG's, likely carrying larger styled rounds as a result, especially since there are less rounds in the Pistol than the SMG.
1:40 only gun I can think of would be the luty smg, but that's more cause it's a pipe gun and it's favorite toast topping is jam
5:00 Bad weapons acadamy: Sydney Sleeper.
1:48 - the Vz.61 Skorpion is a czech PDW (compact smg) that fires 32 acp, a caliber often found in tiny pocket pistols from the early 1900s, while at the same time the czech military was using the Cz.52, a handgun chambered in 7.62 Tokarev, nearly twice more powerful (in regards to kinetic energy, velocity, penetration..)
I believe the reason the SMG is "underutilized" is because its most effective range, the "Danger Zone", will often be... deep inside your own team's territory
Without damage falloff, the Sniper can be effective given any sufficiently open space, even standing inside his own spawn. The "Safe to Sniper" bar should be triple or even quintuple the lengths of the "Danger" and "Please God" zones, and that would better demonstrate the disparity of range-usefulness between the two weapons. Any enemies that are lucky/bold enough to get within that Danger Zone and still be alive are typically so few and so spread out, that a jar of Jarate can be given to each any every one of them, and they'll be finished off by other teammates who the Sniper will be surrounded by or by the Sniper himself via a mini-crit no-scope or the Bushwaka
1:42 I mean... ok; this might be classified as get-out-of-jail-free card but
AM-180 chambered in .22 (smalest conventional ammo, usualy used in training/recreational) thing is with AM-180... is that it has a 177round pan mag... and 1200 RPM or y know 20 rounds a second
FYI Kritz+SMG is comically effective and I wish more people would realize so lol.
Kritz transforms the SMG from a 9mm peashooter to a 7.62(x39)mm menace… in terms of damage.
@@tangerinepaint3643 SMG => Battle Rifle conversion
@@hevnet that too, now that I think about it, 7.62x39mm damage would probably be like 18-22 damage
1:50
American 180 “the swarm of angry bees” is a sub machine gun shooting .22 long rifle rounds at an insanely high rate of fire to compensate for tiny boolet
Compare that to any pistol using a bullet bigger than .22 long rifle like a Glock or a 1911 and you got your answer
1:40 I don't think you need to be a gun expert to know that different calibers exist and that getting shot with any of them will lead to you dying without medical assistance. That's kinda the point of a gun.
There is an smg that is shot for shot half as powerful than your average pistol, it's called the American 180. The American 180 is an smg chambered in 22lr with a top loading disc mag, it's modeled (visually) after the Thompson smg but functions like the dp28 which is a WW2 lmg. And 22lr is a much weaker round than your average 9mm, 45acp, or hell even a 5.7mm, so yeah there's an smg like what you said.
Heyy, someone else who knows the Bee Swarm gun!
God bless the swarm-of-angry-bees gun.
@@hilltopy As a man of (gun) culture like myself, of course I know of the gun that shoots bees. It is a must know for any gun nerd, along with correcting people on the terminology of mags and clips.
exactly the gun i was thinking of
It's so obvious the SMG is based off the American 180. How no one else sees the resemblance is crazy. Thank you for explaining that lore to us, you are very smart and knowledgeable about guns and totally don't just watch a bunch of youtube videos.
It's a fucking game, my guy. It isn't trying to be realistic neither.
12:35
This chat is incomprehensible
6:13 "that looks so sus bruh" LMAO playing sniper in a nutshell, free hostility
3:06 No, it's spy
11:01 Heavy: "Ah f*ck this sh!t."
“I’d love to hear about a sub machine gun that made it out of the factory being less lethal than a handgun”
The problem with this question is that submachine guns and handguns are a very broad and diverse *categories* of guns, a firearm’s stopping power depends on what cartridge it fires and its barrel length
A .50 Action Express out of a handgun would do much more damage than a 9 millimeter out of a carbine.
We don’t know what specific cartridge the Sniper’s SMG or the pistol fires, but if we were to assume they were both in the same caliber then yes the SMG would have better stopping power, accuracy and muzzle velocity from its longer barrel.
pistol boolet deal more damage => sniper smg is 9mm and pistol is .45acp or bigger
The CZ scorpion in .32 ACP
The American 180 in .22 LR
1:40
11:49 if you talking same caliber no. but there are many SMGs with lower cartridges than certain pistols. what would determines the wound capabulity of a weapon is not just ammo but barrel length. a longer barrel makes the bullet have a longer time to acquire speed and a faster projectile can penetrate more.
Back in 2007, nobody had unlocks, so everyone had pistols and SMGs and shotguns.
And let me tell you, nothing dies faster than a Spy to five SMGs.
P.S. And also syringe guns.
fun times...
I want to say you do a great job at this. You present things well, even for people who don't play the game (me), you present things fairly and entertainingly, and you have a good grasp on the actual workings of the game (as opposed to people who have a thousand hours of pro play and entirely incomprehensible balance ideas).
The only thing more I could ask for is people like you for other games. This kind of in-depth mechanical analysis is too rare by half.
2:23 you hella died after the cutaway lmao
1:45 The American 180 is an SMG that fires .22lr at a very high rate. It was intended to prevent overpenetration of walls or vehicles while still being lethal. Another example that comes to mind is the VZ.61 "scorpion," which fires .32acp. Both of these are weaker shot-for-shot than a standard 9mm handgun.
Hey fish! Im a gunsmith and machinist and your question about the SMG vs handgun lethality actually has a pretty nuanced secondary question; what cartridge is each weapon chambered in? Say the SMG was chambered in the anemic .380 and the pistol was chambered in 10mm, the pistol would be nearly twice as dangerous. Examples of firearms that are chambered in .380 arent scarce either, however, the general dynamic of firearms is always going to end up being "nobody wants to be shot, doesnt matter what with" a .22 can put someone out of fighting shape in the right circumstance.
I find the smg makes good harmony with the huntsman, but for normal gameplay it can be good sometimes but its more situational
It's definitely not situational if you don't have perfect aim as Sniper.
If you have perfect aim, there never is any reason to use the SMG outside of the Huntsman and Sydney Sleeper, why waste time dealing miniscule damage if you can land two 150 damage shots.
I've noticed that the smg is unironically one of the best weapons for crit servers. It's high accuracy, magazine size, and fire rate all work together to turn this once puny weapon into a menace to fight against
Was waiting for that Jerma and Ster reference, glad you didn’t disappoint.
6:13 I like how that guy was saying that you may be hacking at the end of that clip.
Uh, Fish? Who's gameplay footage are you using?
2:05
1:48 you can argue the sten/owen gun vs. The standard issue m1911 has this same dynamic but thats because the sten gun is basically a pipe with bullets shoved in it
Smgs are defined usually by the fact that they fire handgun rounds (as well as all the other things that make them machine guns). There are some exceptions, like the MP7 which fires essentially a half handgun half rifle round. But for the most part, you can assume that a given SMG fires a handgun round.
This means that, yes, a handgun CAN be shot for shot more powerful than an SMG, if the handgun's caliber and/or powdercharge is greater. An SMG that fires 9mm will be significantly less powerful shot for shot than a handgun that fires .45cal. The SMG's advantage over handguns is of course the fully auto, as well as *SLIGHTLY* increased accuracy for both the projectile and the wielder. The tradeoff for this overall advantage however is that you have something the size of a small rifle that fires something that has wayyy less penetration than a rifle, due to firing handgun rounds which are often not designed for penetration but rather just raw stopping force.
11:07 no way I didn't think of skinny heavy that's so funny
Not an expert, but as a person who knows stuff about guns, it's entirely possible for an SMG to be less lethal per shot than a pistol. Both SMGs and Pistols use pistol rounds. The difference being that an SMG will mostly be chambered in either 9mm, .45 ACP, 5.7mm, or 10mm. But pistols can be chambered in basically any pistol caliber that isn't .500 magnum, which is barely a pistol caliber. Meaning that they could be chambered in .357 Magnum, .44 Magnum, or even .50 AE. It's why a Desert Eagle does more damage than an MP5 in most games, because the Desert Eagle is in a much higher caliber.
1:50
The “American 180” comes to my mind immediately, a submachine gun that fires .22lr. While common pistols are usually chambered in the larger/faster 9mm or .45, I don’t think anyone would wanna be shot at with 165 rounds of .22lr at 1200 rounds per min
12:30 I understood that reference
1:45 probably the sten maybe?
Or the swarm of angry bees, the .22 smg that held like 100 bullets in a top-fed drum magazine
you make a good point, however the mini-crits of the jarate or hell, even the carbine is WAY too good for me to pass up
but I ignore my rifle and use the bushwaka as a primary so maybe there's a little bias idk
Not a gun "expert", but I do enjoy gun knowledge casually.
Generally speaking, submachine guns are technically "larger handguns" that use the same bullets that most normal handguns use, just that SMGs are on average slightly larger in order to gain the ability to rapidly spit out a bunch of bullets for more damage, more magazine than a standard pistol, and better handling, without having as much physical bulk or firepower (bigger ammunition sizes cost more per bullet) as a full-sized assault rifle or a machine gun.
The true power of an SMG IRL is the ability to spit out more bullets with much less effort than a normal handgun while using the same ammunition (usually).
That being said, there are a bunch of bullet sizes/calibers, so it isn't unheard of for an SMG per shot to be weaker than a handgun, assuming you find the right comparisons.
For an example, I don't think anyone who has seen a Desert Eagle (handgun) chambered for .50 Action Express can say that a single a 9mm from an H&K UMP9 (submachine gun) can outperform it *per bullet*.
For an even stupider yet legendary example of pistols with massive calibers (but this time going into non-mass-produced guns), the mythical Triple Action Thunder is a breech-loaded single shot pistol chambered for .50 BMG, which is *a fucking massive machine gun caliber that is 5.45 inches long before being fired!*
A low caliber SMG “dealing less damage” than a higher caliber handgun makes sense.
The desert Eagle will hurt you a lot more than a 10 mm from a Mac-10
I think the issue is that since you can still headshot people at mid range most snipers probably see the smg as a last resort/crutch for sucking at quickscopes.Engie and scout both use it for mid range because it has better dps than their shotguns at that range while the snipers primary is always his best weapon if you can aim it well enough.TLDR limit snipers range not to headshot when an enemy gets close enough.It would both give a reason to use the smg and make the fight against a good sniper significantly less one sided by putting him at a mechanical disadvantage when at close range rather than a skillful disadvantage(if that makes sense)
1:50 I mean.. most of them. In the modern era, anyway. Handguns tend to have higher calibers than SMGs, since they're designed to fire a large cartridge that does a decent amount of damage, whereas SMGs tend to use lower caliber rounds for faster firing speed and post-pen damage.
1:40
...I mean... that's entirely down to a difference in ammunition. The American 180 for example, which uses (a LOT of) 22 LR is going to have less per shot stopping power when compared to most handguns that use anything bigger than 22 LR, such as a USP chambered in .45 ACP.
1:50 *ahem* desert eagle 50 AE vs any 9mm submachine gun
I rest my case
1:40 It's normal for an SMG to fire weaker ammo than a pistol. The M1911, one of the most popular pistols in the world, typically fires .45 ACP or 10mm Auto. Many SMGs, such as the the American 180, fire ammo as weak as 22lr, which is about half as powerful as .45 ACP & 10mm Auto. Of course, the 180 is the more lethal gun, with its 1200 round/min fire rate. But you did say "shot for shot".
The Tommy Gun fires .45 APC, same as the M1911. The Tommy Gun is one of the more powerful SMGs.
I'm far from a gun expert. This is just stuff I picked up from watching channels like Forgotten Weapons and hickok45.
Battle Medics, Battle Medics, Demoknights, pyro sharks, revolver spy
For a given definition of 'leaving the factory half as lethal as a handgun', there ARE submachine guns in some very anemic calibers (like .32 ACP or .22 long rifle) that do make them incredibly weak compared to period handguns (even 9x19mm, let alone .45 ACP). However, submachine guns use anemic calibers because the country making them is either fitting a niche (you need a very, very tiny submachine gun and the cartridge is a concession to fit the niche since a bigger caliber makes the gun itself too big to be useful in a given role), or typically the country is just using an anemic caliber for its pistols and doesn't want to introduce a new caliber for the submachine gun.
So, if we assume the SMG is in .32 ACP and the Pistol is - in spite of all looks - in a hotter, heavier cartridge like 7.62x25mm Tokarev or 9x19mm (or some special sauce, secret squirrel Mann Co. Original wildcat cartridge), you CAN, theoretically, find a specific combination of cartridges to find a Submachine gun with individual rounds "half as lethal" as a handgun. I wouldn't entirely put it past Saxton Hale to deliberately manufacture SMGs in weaker calibers specifically in an attempt to screw over sniper teams, vehicle crews, and paratroopers that aren't Soldier, since I suspect those are military roles Hale considers 'cowardly'. What kind of man lets a tank do all the fighting?
Okay you’re right the lower damage per shot seems kinda silly but hear me out the original Škorpion vz 61 was an SMG designed as a sidearm for drivers and tank crews, a weapon of last resort. It *vomits* 32 ACP which is about as low-power as pistol rounds get before being more of a joke. The advantage is because 32 ACP is very lightweight and compact compared to say 9mm Makarov (or worse, 7.62 Tokarev which is like a long 9mm case necked down to .30) you can carry more and have a smaller gun, and the lower recoil means your crazy gun that spits bullets is a little easier to use.
11:02 That heavy ragdoll lmao
I've always wanted to find a use for the SMG but never really found one as I (foolishly) kept using it for Spray-n-Prey, the mention of using it as a finisher just clicks in my brain, I'm trying it out next time I boot up the game.
Erm acchshchsajebdusually it’s Pray not prey (Joke)
I use the smg to kill annoying scouts and spys since I suck at aiming close range
Gun expert here. Uuuuh... it depends on the caliber. If the handguns are using .45 ACP and the SMG is using 9mm, then yes. The damage discrepancies would make sense. But if they're using the same caliber, then no. And it wouldn't even be a contest, as an SMG still has a longer barrel, ergo, more velocity when exiting the barrel.
Unless the SMG is shooting 22. LR, then it's not going to have that much of a difference in damage.
Fun Fact: In the Tf2 comics when the robots attack the mercs and they are given guns. The boxes say Submachine Guns, implying it’s a box full of Sniper SMGs.
With a Mac-10 you’ll pepper someone. With an auto mag 3 you’ll punch a hole in them.
1:40
Perhaps the SMG uses a smaller caliber of bullet, hence the damage being weaker.
However if you try to compare the guns to similar real life comparisons they should use the same or a similar caliber.
The Pistol looks to resemble a Walther PPK which was chambered up to 9MM, and Sniper's SMG looks to resemble a Mauser C96 which was also chambered in 9MM.
I'd like to think that Sniper's SMG is chambered in something like 22LR hence the low recoil and ability to track your shots well, while the Pistol is chambered in .380 ACP or 9MM.
gun nerd here
the stock pistol seems to be loosely based on a Colt 1911 handgun, which is chambered in the .45 ACP round, so we can assume that it uses this caliber. meanwhile, the smg is supposedly based on a mat-49 aubmachine gun, which is in 9mm.
tl;dr
pistol is .45 acp
smg is 9mm
.45 > 9mm
pistol does more per-shot damage
1:45 the pistol is a .32 cal from what i figure, and i think the SMG is probably either a .22 Long rifle or a .22 centerfire, the second being known to be pretty shit at killing things, and considering the lack of recoil i'd say its one of the 2.
1:50 The American 180, an SMG designed for use by law enforcement. It uses a drum of 180 rounds of .22 long rifle, which per round is ballistically quite pitiful when compared to the likes of 9x19. It makes up for this with a blisteringly high fire rate of 1200 rounds per minute. This post brought to you by the obnoxious gun pedants that proliferate UA-cam comments.
So fish with the entire smg that’s less damaging than a pistol it’s hard to say since well there’s the side of the bullets, the powder load behind them, lots of factors to consider(for example I think a .500 s&w from a revolver is gonna deal more damage than a 9mm out of an smg) but more to your point, if an smg had a really small barrel and the pistol had a longer barrel than it both days firing 9mm, then theoretically the pistol would be more damaging because it has more velocity to it.
I guess the HK VP70(M) with its stupid 3 round burst stock could be counted as a submachine gun if you stretch the definition. That gun runs on a gas delayed blowback mechanism which means gasses pass by the bullet and slip into the very deeply cut rifling of the barrel jetting forward in order to delay the opening of the action. That unfortunately also means half the gas blows past the bullet making it weaker than any other 9mm pistol around.
Actually, there is a good reason for a pistol to do more damage per shot than an equivalent SMG. Of all guns in a given caliber, SMGs tend to have the worst muzzle energy, due to short barrels and the commonly used blowback operation which wastes energy. Pistols usually use the more efficient inertia operation which retains pressure and spits the bullet out faster. Short pistols can have longer barrels than some SMGs due to it extending further back, which also improves energy and therefore damage.
There's also no reason to assume the SMG and pistol take the same ammo, and even if they are the pistol could be running a higher pressure load in that caliber.
But at the end of the day this is a game where a fat guy eating a sandwich can just shrug off getting repeatedly shot with a comically unrealistic rocket launcher so maybe we just shouldn't look too far into it.
classic smg combo is surprisingly lethal
the only smg I could think of besides some homemade abomination that'd have less terminal impact than a pistol of the same caliber is probably the mp5 ssd because of it's ported barrel it reduces the velocity of standard 9mm ammo to below the speed of sound so that it can make as little noise as possible when suppressed without needing to source different ammo which in a military application would be impractical
The only real-world gun I can think of that would be considered weaker than an average pistol per shot would be the American 180, a .22 caliber submachinegun with a drum style magazine with 100+ round capacity. It's not that it was weaker than another gun in .22, but given many handguns are chambered in .45, 9mm, or .32, it could be said to be weaker per shot. It does shread soft body armor though, as there's practically no felt recoil meaning you can just find a spot on their armor, shoot at it, and effectively drill through the armor with its insane fire rate.
Frankly, I still just don't get the use case for the Sydney Sleeper. Some people claim the support is nice, but really, how does that apply when the Stock Rifle can score a kill in any given situation, or at least leave the target on basically no health? A straight-up insta-kill is arguably better support than making someone more vulnerable to damage.
I can see it sort of make sence in MvM where targets have too much health to be one-shot with stock, and it did make sense with one of the older Sleeper iterations where you'd get a Jarate AoE on charged headshots, allowing you to grant your golden shower to multible enemies, but "I made this enemy easier to kill" is never gonna be as much value as "I killed that enemy"
From the stats the damage reason is likely that the pistol is a higher caliber than the SMG, but Valve is also Valve and I don’t know if I should get into valve guns in a game where everyone says clip about magazine size despite not a single weapon being loaded with stripper clips.
so the thing with firearms is that when you put, say, a 9mm cartridge into a pistol, and you put that same cartridge into a submachine gun, while there are some changes to terminal ballistics? They're both going to do roughly the same amount of damage, at least at close range. It has nothing to do with the construction of the weapon.
There's a bit of an asterisk here in regards to barrel length (longer means faster bullet means more energy), but it isn't going to be so drastic that it would be 'twice as lethal'- and in any case the SMG should win there.
I actually unironically prefer the carbine over the SMG, but only when I'm using the huntsman. If I hit my arrows, the pittance of damage the Carbine deals doesn't matter. And whenever I get a full Crikey meter, I have a legal obligation to instantly die to a random crit which is always super fun!
L furry
W furry
nice pfp :3
W furry
W furry
In the first few seconds, my mind immediately jumped to him saying "Videos like these are made possible by viewers like you, thank you" just like how I'd hear it all the time growing up on... PBS was it?
I like the SMG so much that I keep suggesting that it should also be available as a Scout Primary. I love the Shortstop, and the Pepperboy subclass as a whole a lot...but I can just imagine the sweet life that would be the sustained fire of the nailgun from the TF2 beta, with none of the "projectiles" to worry about. Scout rambles aside...the SMG is by far my favorite Sniper secondary. My favorite Sniper primary is the Huntsman, which does partially explain this fact, but the sheer number of Scouts who see a Sniper and say "them's easy pickins" only to get volley'ed into the dirt by an SMG...I have easily twice as many scout kills with SMGs as I do with Sniper Primaries. The SMG is also much better for dealing with Spies than the Razorback assuming you actually have a brain that is capable of situational awareness.
That was a sus snap tbh lol 2:05
Why is everyone dissing the Carbine ?
In my eyes and experience (and apparently the competitive scene's eyes, seeing how it's banned), it's basically a straight upgrade. While the slower firing rate is noticeable, it actually helps a lot with tracking without noticeably impacting the DPS. And trust me, the 5 less bullets per clip are a completely forgettable "downside". Most of the time, you won't notice, trust me.
But the kicker is the Crikey meter. Paired with either the bushwacka or used on the Carbine itself, it lets you go on some nasty rampage without the announcement that the Jarate provides to the enemy.
It pairs nicely with the primary in its set : the Heatmaker. Only three Bushwacka kills, and you have full Focus meter. And just like the SMG, it covers the weakness of lower bodyshot damage well, which gives you more opportunity to grind the 100 damage requirement. Especialy on buildings.
They did make a thompson chambered in .22 caliber so officers can spray without hurting civilians very much.
1:42 "I'd love to hear about any SMG that made it out of the factory being half as lethal as any given handgun shot."
Valve is a repeat offender with this. Both of Half-Life 1's and 2's SMGs deal less damage per bullet than their respective pistols. 5 vs. 8 in HL1, 4 vs. 5 in HL2.
Yes, they nerfed two already weak weapons in the sequel.
I’ve said to many people over the years that the SMG is secretly a really great gun; also fun fact, the first bullet shot always has 0 spread, it’s clearly intended to be a follow up weapon when you look at it like that.
That was a change made after the game was released (and also applies to every bullet gun except the minigun - pistol, SMG, shotgun, revolver. All 4 fire the first bullet - or first pellet for the shotgun - with 0 spread).
1:46 SMG simply would have a smaller caliber, per the time period and looking at the mag dimensions id say the pistol is .45 while the SMG would be 9mm or .22 or 7.62x25mm as they are smaller but still used in real life SMG‘s, the SMG is based off the Mauser c96 m217 which is a full auto 7.62 x25mm mauser SMG (machine pistol really, which means it would technically do less damage than a .45 as the bullet is smaller but size isn’t everything as per ballistics the mauser has better penetration if armor is involved but if not (bulletproof vests weren’t invented until 1975, the game takes place in 1968/1971[mvm]) the larger size of the .45 (pistol) would bore a larger hole in the target due to its diameter therefore causing more damage, so the game is accurate in this case to real life (mostly)
"I HAVE A GUN"
-Uncle Dane
0:24 Anyone get the reference?