Heavy (6v6)

The Heavy is considered an offclass in the 6v6 metagame. The Heavy is used most of the time as a last resort when defending a point, be it last or 2nd. What the Heavy lacks in speed he makes up for in terms of firepower and damage with his powerful hitscan primary, the Minigun. The Heavy is the class with the highest base health at 300 and also the highest buff health at 450. As a result, when a team pushes into a point, they have to focus their main attention on the Heavy who, if not properly taken care of, will deal large amounts of damage to the opposing team. When the opposing team focuses their attention on the Heavy, it allows for the Combo and the Demoman to retreat. As such, running the Heavy is considered a distraction play.

Strategies + Tips

• When holding last, the Heavy can sit on the high ground and deny jumpers with the Minigun and his health, even if they're Ubered.

• When holding last, you can put your Heavy on the point so the enemy team is unable to win until they finish off his 450 HP, wasting a lot of time.

• When defending against an Uber, you can deny jumpers or hurt people that aren't Ubered with the Minigun, but otherwise, jump and crouch around to waste as much of the enemy's Uber as you can.

• When pushing last, the Heavy can come in at the tail end of an Uber, receive Critheals, clean up the damage made by the Uber with powerful hitscan, and walk onto the point, difficult to dislodge due to his large amount of health.

• When pushing with Kritz, especially on points like Granary last with large sightlines, the Heavy can be useful to flash, or take the full Kritz if the Demo goes down, because of the unrivaled hitscan power of the Minigun, although his mobility limits him on smaller points.

• Heavy is one of the best classes to use when hiding in forward spawn, because they are often close to points, allowing the Heavy to use his health and close-ranged power while mitigating his mobility.

• If you can, try not to be seen by the enemy team before their push, and try not to rev unless there's something to shoot, so as to not alert the other team and allow them to formulate a plan to counter you. Rev noise also obscures important sounds like Medic calls and Spy uncloaks.

• Get critheals. A 450 HP Heavy is a gigantic wall, a 300 HP Heavy is easy pickings. Getting critheals means you minimize the amount of time your Medic isn't healing the rest of your team.

• Try not to get healed when at low health. It takes too long to heal a lit Heavy to full. Get health packs instead, the Heavy's large HP means it's the most efficient class to take health packs.

• Switch off Heavy when pushing out of last. The Heavy's weakness is its speed, and it's difficult to push out when it takes so long to travel between points. This is somewhat less of a problem on small maps like cp_gullywash.

• Don't forget the Shotgun. While very weak compared to the Minigun, in some cases it can be used to chase lit targets and it's faster to respond to surprises without the rev speed of the Minigun.

• If you suspect that there's something to shoot around the corner, jump and rev in midair, this allows you to be more prepared for the enemy without losing speed.

• To dodge headshots while revved, rapidly crouch and uncrouch. While unrevved, you can also jump around and wave your crosshairs around to move your head's position, but the best way is to take cover behind a prop.

• On KOTH maps, the Heavy is great for countering 4-man suicides when holding the point.

• On Attack / Defend maps, setup time mitigates the Heavy's slow speed.

Counters

• Focus fire is the most reliable way to kill a Heavy. Once you get the Heavy down, the rest of the team, probably unbuffed because of the Heavy's insatiable need for heals, will go down relatively quickly.

• Snipers can abuse the Heavy's large hitbox and slow movement to easily get a fully-charged headshot to take it down.

• Kritzkrieg makes it easy to cut through the Heavy's bulk.

• Scout Ubers and their high DPS make it easy to focus down a Heavy.

• Run your own Heavy. In a Heavy vs Heavy fight, whoever revs first wins, so if you catch him by surprise with your own Heavy, you can mow his large hitbox down with your Minigun.

• Pick off the flankers. Heavy absorbs a lot of heals, so your team's flank will have an advantage and you can use those heals to outnumber their team.

See Also

• Heavy
• Heavy (Highlander)