The dynamics of the initial Badland's mid fight have changed a lot over the past year. It used to be 2 teams would meander into mid generally with everyone still alive and soldiers would take their place on their own trains and demos would spam nades from the back of their own train and we had a pleasant and civilized spam war for mid.

Then someone watch a ryb demo and decided that maybe demos should try to get to mid before the soldiers. And thus stickying off the exit of the house became common for this uprising of uncivilized players. As a direct counter to this teams started going all in through valley and jumping up, thus avoiding the bad mannered stickying of the house exit altogether.

So my question is what is the strongest counter to a team going through the valley and jumping up?

I have found that the only way to counter a team that can execute this strategy properly is to send scouts under the bridge and just try to airshot soldiers and demos as they attempt to rocket/sticky jump up onto the train. A pyro also works in these situations, but it is tough because you don't know when the other team will run the srat and when they will just run the normal blands strategy.

Or, you could just do the cheap thing and counter the other team's strat by doing the exact same thing. Then you have a normal mid battle, but you guys are just on opposite trains.

As a demoman it's really easy to see when the opposing team is going valley. You (the demoman) get out there early and notice there isn't a demoman on the balcony or on the cp with you. The next thing I'd do is look below and notice their team is valley. The demoman or scouts just needs to call it out and you can normally see it like 3 seconds before the demoman is causing damage or the soldiers jumped.

I personally as a demoman would just shoot stickies down there and damage them making them think twice about jumping (and probably dying) or not jumping and most likely losing mid. Then it's pretty easy to airshot a soldier because they have to jump with a lot of height, so they strafe less.
Scouts can also be assisting at this time considering they know the team is going valley too. If the demoman doesn't have confidence in his piping, he could just put a few stickies on his train...

It's mainly about scouts/demoman calling it and acting upon it. Soldiers main job is to try and airshot it, or focus on killing the demoman when it lands... The soldier is easy to deal with, the demoman is harder unless he's noticed early because how high his stickies put him.

FaN always helps!

If you take the normal house route to mid as a demo you get there at around 9:43, after throwing out your first sticky to their house you could immediately start blind stickying their valley but in here in North America it's just as likely that the other team's demo is slow to mid and so you'll probably shoot a few more stickies that way or maybe just watch there until your scouts call something or you can see someone from the enemy.

Even if you do start blind stickying the valley immediately I think it is reasonable that it takes you until about 9:38 to be able to see your stickies so you can react and det them. I'd expect a proficient team to have a well healed soldier ready to jump at 9:40 and the second soldier ready to jump no more than 2 seconds later. It is quite easy for a rocket (say from the soldier who isn't healed enough to jump yet) to scatter them as well. Add to this that the enemy demo could have jumped at 9:44 with a full buff, not been visible to you or your scouts until likely 9:42 landed on your train at 9:41 or his balcony.

I don't think that a demo, having gone the normal way to mid and exiting the house at 9:43 can effectively prevent the team from jumping up through the valley. The fastest a soldier will exit the house going the normal route is 9:40 and it is doubtful that he will be able to airshot the soldier who has jumped at that same time and lands on his train only a second later and the soldier jumping has much easier shots to take.

Note that I base these numbers off the heal order and jump orders that I developed with pureEsports during ESEA S3.

Note that the strongest counter doesn't have to stem from a standard mid push, and indeed I think the valley push is one of the strongest counters to the standard house push given 2 equally skilled teams full of proficient players there has to be a strategy that tips the balance beyond trying for low probability air shots.

To start off I was thinking that perhaps your team's (the team countering a valley push) scouts might try to take control of the enemy house and health pack inside thereby denying anyone that is weak access and securing 2 mid health packs for your team to try and tip the balance. This is not a full strat hardly a partial strat just an idea. I want to build a full strat that is the strongest counter to the valley push. If necessary I can go into detail about the pureEsports valley push so we are all on the same page.

The counter I've found to practically ANY mid push on badlands is pretty simple- get on point. If you can call out the jumps from below early, you can maneuver your medic quickly and not die, while swiftly stopping the attacking force, as they no longer have a steady health stream. If they're pushing from house and take 2-3 seconds to get onto their carts, you can be doing massive damage to their concentrated group. Furthermore, your ability to move in the middle makes your position much less spamable than theirs.

OK so get on point is your goal. What are the details? Are you getting on point faster than they are pressuring you with their valley jumps? Generic statements aren't enough. You need to piece together individual responsibilities (classes, jumps, route, locations, timing, health pack taking, etc.) to form a cohesive strategy. You don't have to do it all in one go, strategies are generally best when evolved from many small revelations.

Let's start it this way. What is the first thing you are going to have to deal with?


demo is in play at 9:41
scouts are in play at 9:42
first soldier is in play at 9:40
second soldier is in play at 9:38
medic is in play at around 9:40


So the first thing you're going to be able to do damage to is the scouts. If you focus your demo+scouts on their scouts you might be able to do some serious damage to them. The fact that you engaged the scouts before the demo might clue you in to watch for a flying demoman from valley. However being able to determine that they are pushing valley is not the focus here. We can just say you guess they are going valley and focus all of your attention on stopping that with a blind counter.

So maybe instead of focusing on the scouts with your demo you have your demo ready up a sticky to airburst their flying demo, I consider mid range air sticky bursts to be reasonably high probability here and would be comfortable relying on it. If you then rush your scouts directly onto your train you could probably scatter spam him down before he dets any stickies, while only taking some long range scatter fire in return.

Jaeger can you please go into detail about the pureEsports valley push? I've got a couple ideas but I'd like to make sure I know exactly what you are talking about first. A demo/video would be optimal if possible.

If you know a team likes to do this always have 1 scout go your shithouse (or whatever you guys call it). Scatter meatshot will knock a soldier back down, but if you really want to be annoying use the FaN. You can easily 2-shot any rushing enemy scout and any jumping soldier will just end up in the valley again. Noticed that vs most teams one of your own scouts near your train makes all the difference (he can knock people back, be there early and do massive damage to anyone that still manages to land on your train). Just make sure the enemy scouts don't run rampant (have your 2nd scout play defensive until after the jumping stuff is done).

From my experience, the valley jump is always somewhat delayed. It seems like there's a period where the demoman (not the one doing valley jump) can go on crate and see it happening. I'll look into it more today. But the opposing combo has to come back out of the valley still, back on their side... So possibly having that stickied still is a good idea, as they either have to try and go through the trap or spread it.

Also, earlier, I was saying I'd lob a few stickies down to make them hurt and think twice about jumping. I'll find out the time of everything when I get home after work/school. The jumping demoman might damage people, but in the duration that he's in the air he will probably get a max of one kill. Once he lands he'll have to try to fall back into valley where a scout should chase him and finish him off.

Yeah sorry about generics; my team never truly likes to define things (ie- pocket/roaming), and rather picks up on each others' nuances from being together for a long time. As a result, we always go for the flexible route rather than a set strategy. I'll see what I can look into today or tomorrow, depending or my free time.

A demo/video would be optimal if possible.

Yeah, I'd like to see a demo of this working myself. Maybe Fish can record it next time his team attempts it or tries to counter it??

First of all, one of the easiest counters to an extremely fast demoman (one that gets a sticky across mid at 9:45 - 9:46 going the normal - through house route) is to have the opposing scouts go shithouse. This keeps the demo in check for pretty much the remainder of game and forces him to either slow his mid jumps down or sticky shithouse instead of the opposing house.

It seems to me that the logical counter to the valley rush would be a split attack. While soldiers are on the box you would need to push this the same way you'd push back from choke. By this I mean, scouts going valley, combo going through either house or choke, and demo jumping controlled spam jumping them.

Other than falling back and then pushing again the only other counter I can see would be to push valley yourself. With your demo getting there as fast as theirs, you should be able to see if something is up. If you both execute the same strategy then it comes back to the good ole' days.

Jaeger can you please go into detail about the pureEsports valley push? I've got a couple ideas but I'd like to make sure I know exactly what you are talking about first. A demo/video would be optimal if possible.

Sure I'll probably make a video on it at some point but for now:


round start medic heals demo
demo sticky jumps to door
medic heals soldiers
soldiers do 27dmg rjs and get closer to door
now everyone can move
demo sticky jumps down to the lower level
soldiers rj down to the lower level
scouts and medic run forward and down to the lower level
every class walks up the stairs and out drop down
scouts take drop down go through house and exit into mid @ 9:42
scouts try to stay near their train and distract until the push unfolds
medic is healing soldiers until catches up to demo
first soldier drops out of drop down, does 27dmg rj to the corner
second soldier drops out of drop down, continues walking
demo drops out of drop down, walks to corner and with a full buff puts one sticky down near the corner and jumps into the mid fight
medic heals first soldier some more, he jumps off wall a few feet passed the corner after getting a reasonable buff, lands in the raised ground of the valley near their train, and rjs up onto their train @ 9:40
second soldier walks all the way out of drop down around the corner hugs the wall between the house under balcony and the mini-spire and rjs up into mid @ 9:38
medic follows the path of the second soldier and continues walking up onto the cp

If you know a team likes to do this always have 1 scout go your shithouse (or whatever you guys call it). Scatter meatshot will knock a soldier back down, but if you really want to be annoying use the FaN. You can easily 2-shot any rushing enemy scout and any jumping soldier will just end up in the valley again. Noticed that vs most teams one of your own scouts near your train makes all the difference (he can knock people back, be there early and do massive damage to anyone that still manages to land on your train). Just make sure the enemy scouts don't run rampant (have your 2nd scout play defensive until after the jumping stuff is done).

This works well so long as the enemy demo doesn't rape your scouts with stickies from the sky before he lands and the soldiers come into play. Combined with the air sticky I suggested earlier. This seems like a good start.

the scouts from your team should either try and get into cubby/shithouse(lol?) or if quick enough get into the opposing house and flank the medic as he comes up, if they are able to control the opposing teams house it blocks their exit if something were to go wrong. tbh though a video or a demo of two teams actually trying to execute it would be really good(two teams that are on the same level, meaning jumps dont get fucked up and the demo/scouts let their team know that the opposing team is probably coming valley)

First of all, one of the easiest counters to an extremely fast demoman (one that gets a sticky across mid at 9:45 - 9:46 going the normal - through house route) is to have the opposing scouts go shithouse. This keeps the demo in check for pretty much the remainder of game and forces him to either slow his mid jumps down or sticky shithouse instead of the opposing house.


You can get stickies on mid going the normal through house route at 9:46? WTF would love to see this. Fastest I've seen is Ryb getting one off at 9:44 and the vast majority of fast demos I see getting their first one off at 9:43.

P.S. I see most North American demos get their off between 9:42 and 9:40 btw.

P.P.S. Countering a fast demo through house doesn't really seem relevant to countering an all heavy valley push

Here's another idea to think on.

If your scouts run through the valley and straight under the point to their slope they will be too slow to impact the demo or first soldier jumping but they will pose a huge threat to the second soldier and his medic, if the second soldier jumps away his medic is going to be basically dead.

If he stays and fights then the scouts have a huge positional advantage with high ground, rocks, and the bridge to help dodge rockets and access to the enemy house and medium health pack therein.

Assuming the 2nd solly stays and fights they have their demo and soldier by your train but you have 2 soldiers a demo and a medic and access to a medium health pack by your train if you came through house. Their positional advantage should then give way to your overwhelming firepower and health advantage.

Their scouts then have to make a split second decision on who to support. There will have a small delay before they are doing meaningful damage as they run to whichever group they decide to support.

If you can manage to wipe out either group (probably the one their scouts didn't support) you should have an advantage.

I seem to notice that oftentimes the scouts that are more aggressive and either get kills or become a distraction will help their team win mid. I see 20ID's scouts do this really effectively. Too often I see scouts just sit back near the combo doing 5 damage shots that don't do much. Not only that but they're taking spam (which if hits them, also hurts people near them) and require the medic to heal them more.

Back on topic. If you know the opposing team is going to do valley before round begins, then have a scout run FaN. It should be really effective against the soldier jumping (not so much the demoman because he's really high in the air). Yet, as I've said before, the demoman is going to kill 1 person max and do some damage while he's in the air and when he first lands. By that time, your scouts should act and assuming the opposing teams pocket jumps up as well the demoman is going to fall down to the valley unprotected. That makes for an easy kill on the demoman who is really vital to winning mid.

It's really just a chain reaction, all you need is for your demoman/scouts to act fast at the beginning. Demoman attacking or preventing the jumpers from causing too much damage, while the scouts finish off the kill. Both the demoman and the soldier from the opposing team will fall back to valley. So your scouts can either be positioned near the crates, or below to finish those players off. With them 2 down or at minimum, 2 very hurt, you guys can be more aggressive and take mid.

I've found when we (Strickland) are doing the valley jump, we tend to send our scouts low and then come left (jumping up onto point from our side), demoman takes the traditional route (exiting house front door), and our soldiers walk down and both jump onto their crate at the same time, the medic walks up and sticks with the demoman until the soldiers fall left and backwards off their crates.

For the most part, we've had very much success with this strat against FAST teams that get there to middle (good teams) but for some reason, we fail at it every time vs. mediocre/slow teams (med/bad teams). It's usually because the delay from the bad teams allows them to just exit the house while we're jumping onto crates, allowing their soldiers to rj onto us on the crates negating the whole element of surprise/high ground. The good teams however usually push middle point or start to hop on the crates, giving our soldiers the advantage.

A soft counter to the valley push, from my experience, is just being slower than the jumping team so you aren't in a vulnerable spot. (Obviously this would fail had we sent our demo onto their crates to sticky them into the house.)

The only reason RJing soldiers from valley even works is because if that soldier(s) on your train live for longer than 3 seconds, you have lost mid as that soldier has either blown his load (aka 4 rockets + a shotgun or two here and there) and has done massive damage to your team, or your team has thrown too much ammo at him and now the rest of the team will just walk up and out-spam you.

The only real counter to it is to wait and see where the soldiers are going and then RJ on them after they RJ so you have the advantage and essentially insta-gib them (which is why badlands mid has basically turned into a meta-game of RJing soldiers because of how close quarters it is)

The other only real counter I've seen is to counter-suicide a soldier/demo/scout/whatever right as the enemy team is pushing up to essentially split their team into two (players on your train and players that are trying to push up but first must kill the player who's suiciding onto them) so that the majority of your team can kill the person(s) on your train and then immediately counter-push (which can also be countered by suiciding yet another player by the other team via scout flank/whatever)

I think I mostly agree with what you say Seagull.

That last thought of yours is what I was getting at in #17.

My concern is the mechanics of using your later RJs to counter their RJ from valley. If you go through the house normally you're going to get to the doorway after their demo can get several stickies down at it and be able to rj clear of the doorway about the same time their first jumping soldier can be sending rockets at the doorway. I'm not sure if you can get out and get a clear rj that way.

You could instead send a soldier through the house to your balcony or window and rj from there. From here you should be able to jump by 9:39 which will let you jump when their soldier is landing so you will have your later rj.

The other option I see is to exit the house normally and use your demo+scouts to prevent their demo from slowing you down by stickying your house exit. If their demo can't slow you down then you should be able to clear the exit and rj in time to prevent their first soldier from bouncing you in the doorway.

Another thing I was wondering is why don't most teams do the 'left' way of badlands more? This is the way where the demoman, soldiers and medic go below the 1st and the demoman puts 2 stickies down and jumps from the bridge next to spire. I'm not sure the exact time differential, but the demoman gets there like 3 (maybe more, maybe less) seconds earlier then the scouts or demoman who goes the normal way. And the soldiers get there around 2 seconds later than if they went the normal way BUT they don't have to deal with sticky traps or spam that comes when they first leave the house.

Even if it doesn't become the default, what are the negatives that nobody does it as an alternate strategy?

As Seagull said, the only real counter is you must kill the soldiers that are on your train ASAP. The real advantage of a valley strat is when you surprise the enemy. So what I used to do with my scout partner is 1 of us would generally play a bit more passive initially at our cubby and spot down in to their valley area and try to get an early call so we can get ready (pre sticky our trains / cubby area etc).

When we did our valley strats we would send demo/sold/med lower and scout to their cubby. The demo and soldier get buffed and RJ up and meanwhile the scout at cubby can go out the same time they land and tries to get 1-2 meatshots and then falls back. The medic runs up our hill and connects with the other soldier that went through the house and they try to push up on the point, while the other scout basically makes sure their scouts don't get behind or jump at the medic.

As for #22, you get their 1-2 seconds faster going that way as demo (see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VOXSlBzQBZ8) but you need a medic to go with you so you get an overheal which means you also need another class as well. The main disadvantage is that it's more difficult to get a medkit and it's easier to take spam damage.

Another thing I was wondering is why don't most teams do the 'left' way of badlands more? This is the way where the demoman, soldiers and medic go below the 1st and the demoman puts 2 stickies down and jumps from the bridge next to spire. I'm not sure the exact time differential, but the demoman gets there like 3 (maybe more, maybe less) seconds earlier then the scouts or demoman who goes the normal way. And the soldiers get there around 2 seconds later than if they went the normal way BUT they don't have to deal with sticky traps or spam that comes when they first leave the house.

Even if it doesn't become the default, what are the negatives that nobody does it as an alternate strategy?

You give up the med kit, easy access to the cp, and height advantage and still put yourself at a small choke that can be stickied by a demo. Basically it takes away your ability to be aggressive. However you can send just the demo that way and it does work.

Back on topic:

So by my interpretation thus far the best counter to the rush described earlier is:


round start medic heals demo
demo sticky jumps to door
medic heals soldiers
soldiers do 27dmg rjs and get closer to door
now everyone can move
demo sticky jumps down to the lower level
soldiers rj down to the lower level
scouts and medic run forward and down to the lower level
demo sticky jumps to the top of the stairs
soldiers rj to the top of the stairs
demo sticky jumps out of drop down goes through house
demo takes health pack and exits into mid @ 9:43
demo fires first 1-2 stickies at enemy house exit and upon not seeing the enemy demo turns to airburst sticky the jumping enemy demo
both scouts take drop down
first scout through house and exits into mid @ 9:42 and moves over to cubby and near train can help shoot the jumping enemy demo and first soldier
second scout goes through valley straight underneath and arrives at the enemy slope to threaten the second soldier and medic @ 9:40
soldiers continue out of drop down and rj up to the house
medic continues out of drop down and into the house healing the first soldier
first soldier reaches house exit with a good buff @ 9:40 and jumps to kill the enemy's first soldier who has jumped just before
second soldier continues through house to window/patio getting healed by medic and rjs out onto enemy soldiers @ 9:39 which with the height advantage from jumping from higher ground should give you an advantage even if the enemy second soldier jumps later


From here strategy gives way to tactics and the battle will unfold. Assuming proficient execution and equal skill the team going through house should win the fight against the team going through valley. I'd be interested in playing these 2 theories against each other as this counter to the valley has the wonderful property of being easily adaptable to fight a standard house push.

Correct me if I'm wrong but one problem I see there is that nobody will be contesting their scouts. Perhaps #16 can play around your demo at the start (that way offering some resistance to their scouts and protecting your demo) and if possible get a buff from your medic and then go to their window/pillar area or just play on and around the point.

Would work #24 as long as you notice they're going valley fast enough.

I'd also like to see this in a scrim, because I've never seen a valley jump without me having a 1-2 second time where I can see it forming basically.

I havent read all the posts yet, but a demoman can do this to *attempt* to counter the valley rush.

sticky jump out to battlements as he usually would, drop down through that cubby thing and at this point should be relatively buffed (at least 200hp) and can single or even double sticky jump across the yard and to the back of his own teams train.

He can probably do this faster than the enemy soldiers can jump onto mid, here he can theoretically sticky the train/mid/closet and then use the stairs to yard as a fallback point as his soldiers get to mid.

Correct me if I'm wrong but one problem I see there is that nobody will be contesting their scouts. Perhaps #16 can play around your demo at the start (that way offering some resistance to their scouts and protecting your demo) and if possible get a buff from your medic and then go to their window/pillar area or just play on and around the point.

Yes their scouts are being ignored in an attempt to quickly dispatch their demo and soldier and gain an overwhelming advantage in spam and positioning.

Their scouts might go to attack the scout on the slope to support their medic, but most likely they'll focus on the soldier jumping from balcony which is a place soldiers quite often jump from to land on the enemy train which is where the enemy scouts are if you remember. The soldier is actually going to his own train so he should only eat a bunch of long range scatters from those scouts and after helping to clean up whatever had jumped up should be clustered with his other soldier demo and medic and a scout and they should be able to hold off the scouts reasonably well.

The way I see it unfolding you will likely trade the life of your scout on their slope for their demo and soldier and positional advantage over their combo. Then you can focus on engaging their scouts.

The fighting defined in these steps should all play out in a matter of less than 5 seconds, and I don't think the scouts with their position near the enemy train need factor into it. However, I welcome being proven wrong by testing this out soon.

I havent read all the posts yet, but a demoman can do this to *attempt* to counter the valley rush.

sticky jump out to battlements as he usually would, drop down through that cubby thing and at this point should be relatively buffed (at least 200hp) and can single or even double sticky jump across the yard and to the back of his own teams train.



You don't usually have a buff after doing your jumps to battlements

from spawn to door
from door to lower
from lower to battlements

You don't usually have a buff after doing your jumps to battlements

from spawn to door
from door to lower
from lower to battlements


I was thinking more of this:

Skip sticky jump to door (that saves you no more than 2-3 seconds and downs you 50hp minimum)

Jump from outside spawn door to near bottom of stairs.

Assuming you were fully buffed to 260, you should have approximately 190-200 health upon landing this jump, depending on how much juice you got into the jump.

Walk up the stairs, hold up one second to receive another flash of heals, proceed to double sticky jump straight to closet. Land with probably under 100hp but with enough time to unload stickies and spam pipes while falling back to yard. Remember jumping soldiers will probably be focusing on your house, not expecting a demo have come from yard.

you guys at some point wanted to see examples of demo openings on badlands.


below are two examples of the standard, and by that i mean what i normally see in my games and those that i watch, demo mid opening that is done very well:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EnLTD-3UVak -- demo beats the scouts by half a second
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=exzmIVJC9u8 -- demo beats the scouts by about 2 seconds

the following here is a second, yet different, way of doing it -- its less common than the above example, but its just as practical imo:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZSgz5VLwgs

and here is a crazy creative way that i've only seen done in the following video, but still looks pretty badass and practical considering his health when he gets to the mid (and also he only needed 2 jumps after the spawn door jump)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0z4qOd844G8

on this last one, he got his overheal reinforced as he ran to the bottom door, so that means the medic went down through the lower door there out the gate. just thought it was worth noting if you guys ever try it in a game.




edit -- since i know you're a pocket soldier hitman here's an example of a good soldier run to mid, while i'm looking around for that stuff: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XVD_3f8q7DM

edit again -- here's a decent demo race to granary's middle: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tsoXfeGl74c

That opening that Byte does has been my favorite for awhile. It gives you a good view of valley and excellent spam onto trains and into house.

It took me forever to learn though.

Because Euros can't airstrafe :D

#31 all of those videos can be improved upon.

Here is a video of what I have been referring to when I talk about the normal demo route to mid in this thread.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFG1m4VzHVM

If you (the demo) use the reptile jump to your train, you will have plenty of time to see the valley strat coming. The only problem we run into with that is that I am left standing on the car with the scouts around and the soldiers+demo jump up and out spam me before our combo can get good positioning.

Maybe a good way to counter the valley rush is to send demo through yard with 2 stickies, but have the soldiers go through the house assuming house is actually faster for soldiers.

Is house faster for soldiers?

The biggest problem with that jump is that you are down to about half health afterwards, even long range double scout pistol fire is enough to give you trouble.

FWIW that particular clip poor representation of what is possible. You can land on the far edge of your train basically at the cp.

And yes it is faster for soldiers to go valley or house than through yard.

edit -- since i know you're a pocket soldier hitman here's an example of a good soldier run to mid, while i'm looking around for that stuff: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XVD_3f8q7DM

edit again -- here's a decent demo race to granary's middle: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tsoXfeGl74c

Thanks, Wand, I'll check these out when I get home from work. The team needs to work on their openings so this will help out a lot. Thanks for putting in all the effort.

There are a couple of alternative strategies to try to counter the valley rush. The soldiers can rush valley themselves. Maybe it is strange, but the soldiers doesnt have to deal with the opposite soldiers jumping on their trains. Another try is the soldiers going from spire. Maybe you give up a healthpack, but the aggressive soldiers from valley didnt have a healthpack too. Soldiers dont have problems with stickytraps and rockets, so they can rocketjump on their own train without much trouble.

Another thing to note. When the opposite demo is very fast and aggressive and can sticky the house. Then the soldiers who go through the house have problems to exit. It is this time of hesitating that the opposite team use to his advantage and send soldiers to the trains and can do massive damage at your soldiers who are in or leaving the house.

In my opinion the solution lies in the weak medic soldiers combo. The soldiers has to be fast, so most of the time not fully overhealed before they jump. And to be really fast they need to do more jumps. This means the soldiers doesnt have full health when landing on the trains. A scout can kill them in 2 or 3 shots. Also the medic has to go through the valley. While a medic in the house is very safe, a medic in the valley can be flanked from all sides. A couple of strategies to flank to medic: a scout can go valley go under the point directly for the medic, a scout can go through shithouse and flank from the side, a scout can jump/drop from the point directly to the medic. A soldiers can rocketjump out of the house or from choke directly to the medic and kill them. A demo can spam over the trains and lob nadespam in the enemy valley and hurt the medic. The demo can stickyjump (when one soldier already jumps) directly to the medic and kill him.

So aggressive soldiers are quiet weak and can be taken down with two nades or scattergun shots. Also the medic is very weak and can be flanked from all sides. So it is just the the task to find the weak spot (the spot that isnt defended by the enemy scouts) to get the medic.

Ow, and there are also funny counters. Like a FAN scout or an airblast pyro that just denies all the aggressive jumps.

The biggest problem with that jump is that you are down to about half health afterwards, even long range double scout pistol fire is enough to give you trouble.

FWIW that particular clip poor representation of what is possible. You can land on the far edge of your train basically at the cp.

And yes it is faster for soldiers to go valley or house than through yard.

Reptile had nearly full health because the medic went downstairs with him. It wouldn't be too hard to seal off closet plus spam house, all the while determining whether the enemy is pushing valley and falling back to your own house as well.

edit: sorry no he didnt but the medic was so close behind him that there really wasn't much risk because immediately he sealed off the routes most likely to be used by anyone attacking him. Plus I doubt many people will beline straight straight for a demo with stickies everywhere while there is still 2 scouts running around mid.

You can get stickies on mid going the normal through house route at 9:46? WTF would love to see this. Fastest I've seen is Ryb getting one off at 9:44 and the vast majority of fast demos I see getting their first one off at 9:43.

9:46 isn't possible, 9:45 is the fastest (if you do the 2nd jump like shown in this video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mahD5AwudWk). I know it's 9:44 there, but 9:45 is possible). However, what you can do is throw a sticky over the house while jumping to the bridge by the resupply. With some practice you could land it on valley or their house exit.

9:46 isn't possible, 9:45 is the fastest (if you do the 2nd jump like shown in this video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mahD5AwudWk). I know it's 9:44 there, but 9:45 is possible). However, what you can do is throw a sticky over the house while jumping to the bridge by the resupply. With some practice you could land it on valley or their house exit.

I've seen your video before extremer, but does that actually work? Seems like you are taking full damage from both of your first sticky jumps as you are just crouch+detting and then you are taking fall damage from the second one and you are doing it fast enough that I don't think you're even going to get near 260 health from a normal medic buff. Then you don't take the pill at the top of the stairs. It seems to me that without hurtme you would likely have blown yourself up at the dropdown jump or at best arrived in mid with basically just the health gained by taking the medium pack.

Have you done this, with this speed, using just realistic medic heals?

Reptile had nearly full health because the medic went downstairs with him. It wouldn't be too hard to seal off closet plus spam house, all the while determining whether the enemy is pushing valley and falling back to your own house as well.

edit: sorry no he didnt but the medic was so close behind him that there really wasn't much risk because immediately he sealed off the routes most likely to be used by anyone attacking him. Plus I doubt many people will beline straight straight for a demo with stickies everywhere while there is still 2 scouts running around mid.

The medic really wasn't that close behind him. He landed at 9:44 and didn't start getting healed again until 9:38. If you have paid attention to the timings in this thread you will remember that a lot of shit can happen in initial fight on badlands by that time.

I've seen your video before extremer, but does that actually work? Seems like you are taking full damage from both of your first sticky jumps as you are just crouch+detting and then you are taking fall damage from the second one and you are doing it fast enough that I don't think you're even going to get near 260 health from a normal medic buff. Then you don't take the pill at the top of the stairs. It seems to me that without hurtme you would likely have blown yourself up at the dropdown jump or at best arrived in mid with basically just the health gained by taking the medium pack.

Have you done this, with this speed, using just realistic medic heals?

Yes, but I have to take the pill.

I'm curious as to how effective the hypse jump could be in countering this (or just at all in normal play).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Gmld1e-RLQ#movie_player
Fast forward to 1:24 to see it.

It's only effective if the enemy demoman doesn't call your demo jumping.

Also you can do it with one sticky instead of 2, and solidsnake tries it like once a match/scrim and I don't think it has ever worked in our favor.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EnLTD-3UVak -- demo beats the scouts by half a second


This is still not the fastest, you need to bounce up the stairs inside the base and don't hit the doorpost. Saves another 0.5-1sec. That's prob the hardest part to get right (see Ryb video). That video shows what any mid skilled demo does.

And my God, that demo race to mid gran is so slooooooooooooooooow

A lot of the conversation so far has been focusing on how to stop the first rjing soldier but I think there is another really important weakness of the valley rush. The positioning of the medic approaching the capture point is a lot worse than when he would come from the house. The demo and scouts can take advantage of this by trapping the medic below, here is the rundown.

-One scout when coming out of the house jumps directly onto his own box to call if it is a lower rush or not. (this same scout can tear into a soldier if he jumps up right next to him)
-Demo goes the fastest route to middle and first two stickies are fired at house. Then once he hear the low rush call he will sticky the slope. And fire a few rolling pipes down the hill when he gets the chance but the main point is to just leave around 4 lying stickies the delay the medic long enough so the rest of the team can use the high ground advantage.
-Finally the other scout will just keep and eye on the other scouts and maybe flank the medic from below if the opportunity is there.

I have seen used already in an ESEA demo I watched and it seems to really annoy the combo. It also prevents that second soldier from rjing because then the medic is left high and dry if he doesn't try to blast the stickies out of the way. If you can trap the medic low you stop him from having the health pack but also make it a lot easier for scouts to flank him from above and soldiers to rain down on him. So by the time the stickies are blown away your soldiers can focus the slope if they try to come up. Going low is an aggressive strategy but if you can meatshot the jumping soldier and put him away quickly the medic positioning could win you the round. Let me know if you think the would work.

Moving to sticky off the slope so early means that you only have a single scout to deal with the jumping demoman. In a past scrim I have seen that jumping demo easily rape 2 scouts at our train 4 rounds in a row. This is why we originally stepped back and thought up airbursting him with a sticky. So I think that the scout near train needs support from his demo to fight off their demo. Combined with the threat of the scout on their slope your demo should still have enough time to sticky off their slope after this.

But will your demo survive the enemy's first jumping soldier if he is ignoring him to sticky off the enemy slope? If he can't than stickying the slope is fairly pointless.

True, if your demo dies quickly there is no reason to sticky the slope but maybe you can just sticky the very top of the slope with about 3 stickies including the first sticky that can be at the near corner of the house door and still at the top of the slope. Then he can focus on piping soldier or scouts. It just seems like there could be potential in being able to delay the other team on the low ground and with a more vulnerable attack. Maybe using the demo to do this isn't the best or there is a better way to do it but when a team takes the low ground the factors that stand out are the height advantage and vulnerability and positioning of the medic. Maybe changing the role of the scouts could make this work a lot better but it seems like if your demo can delay their medic coming up the slope until your soldiers can spam it you have a great angle for attack on their combo because of the angled terrain.

Maybe the scouts could move in and out of your cubby to avoid the demo fire but if both of your scouts get raped by a jumping demoman you are usually done for anyways. If you know where they will probably land it might be good to have a scout waiting in cubby to dodge the initial fire but then pop out and kill them quick. This is again a matter of dealing with the jumping soldiers and demo but if you can deal with that you can hold your high ground advantage if delay their combo.

I was playing in a pug team last night, and the valley attack the opponents were doing made them so vulnerable. After we all got the soldier who was jumping on our crate, there combo was still trying to push up the slope. Our scouts were below already harassing them, and then someone called we should all spam them from above. It seemed like we wiped them every time. They tried it for like 3 rounds then just gave up on it because it wasn't successful at all.

That is a good example but the question is will it work against the speed of professional teams because I would expect you would own them if they were slow and weren't able to escape the valley on time. I am glad it has a good initial effect, thanks for the info kermit.

Thread Necro:

I was wondering if anybody had/could make a video showing the best way to juggle heals and make jumps for all 3 members of the combo in order to get to mid with the best balance of health and speed? Bonus if it also shows how the Scouts and Demo can play mid until the Med gets there, and then how to protect the Med as he walks up.

I've been trying to play the valley push with both my team and some pug teams pretty recently but it seems like no matter how conservatively I jump, or how well I land 27-hops, I can still only reach mid with barely an overheal (I would say 220 on average, and that's a high estimate), leaving me at under 200 if I jump as soon as I can. The other soldier inevitably has the same amount of overheal.

Jaeger's (creep's) tips and tricks shows a pretty-much optimal way to manage heals at the start of blands.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WCzCJcQjxPY

The key thing in arriving with your 2 sollies at 300 (first jumper) and 200 (second jumper) is getting crit heals on them before their first jump. I always heal the demo to 260 (9:58), get both sollies up to 250-270 (9:56.5) then back to the demo for 24hp/s (9:55). Then both the demo and the sollies will be able to land at the lower door with 175 and (almost) 200. You can only really afford to have 1 solly jump towards the door while unable to move this way, and you often have to forgo this, but that doesn't matter nearly as much when going valley as arriving at the correct health. Demo outdistances you as normal, both sollies do a 27-30 damage jump up the stairs and a 27-30 damage jump over the bridge, and you hit mid with the ideal health for a jump at 9:40/9:39 and 9:39/9:38.

I find it also helps for your scouts to split up in the first room: 1 runs up top, 1 runs through the bottom and up. Then it's less likely that you'll miss the buff on one due to them clipping into each other. Additionally, if you go under and up as medic (which you should), you can give the scout who goes under a touch as he's going up stairs, letting him get to mid at just over 140hp.

In list form:
59-58: Crit heal demo to 260
--Demo jumps to door--
58-57: Crit heal solly 1 to 270
--Solly 1 jumps to door--
57-56: Crit heal solly 2 to 250
56-55: Heal demo
--Movement starts--
55-51: Heal sollies
51-50: Crit heal scout going upper
50-49: Crit heal scout going lower
49-40: Heal sollies

What this looks like at the mid point (assuming normal routes are taken):
45-44: Demoman arrives with 175hp
42: Scouts arrive with ~140hp
40: Solly 1 arrives with 300hp, solly 2 arrives with ~225hp. Solly 1 jumps.
39: Solly 2 jumps with 250hp.

A bit off topic now, but the problem I see with most people's valley strats is that after the sollies jump, the medic is left alone to either run up to train (or through maintenance) or chill out in valley (if he gets stickied off). In my opinion, what you should be doing is having 1 or both scouts cover the medic starting at 39-38. This lets you make up for any damage the scouts took in the 3 seconds before they meet the medic, and gives you a nice set of buffed scouts to clean up the enemies the sollies just jumped on. Additionally, it prevents your sollies from having to deviate from the plan and cancel their jump to deal with the scout rushing your medic underneath (the obstacles/height difference in that area makes it a huge pain for a solly to fight a scout there).

Even more off topic, since this thread discusses timing rather thoroughly, it might be helpful to link this:
http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AdqfIUAbWZM8ZGduZm41amhfN2d0NHJuM2hi&hl=en
I spent a few hours running various paths on the popular maps to get mid timings for things like this. It may be handy for working out more specific strats than "okay, so sollies are going to jump when they get there and have enough health, at that point our scouts should cover our medic and our demo should wm1m2 up". Also, if you notice any times there that are off, please let me know and I'll fix them. I'm by no means a practiced demoman, so I may have assumed some times that are too early or arrived too late on some maps.

Going valley, do you want the second jump for soldiers (from bottom up the 2 sets of stairs)? Or do you want to walk that part in an attempt to get critical heals before you leave the dropdown?

I think it's too slow without the jump up the stairs. Waiting for crit heals in the middle of the jump sequence generally isn't worth it in my experience. Best to leave them to the start, or let a solly outdistance the med a lot (gran, follower) then get crit heals right before entering mid.

If you wanted to go for crit heals I would include the stair jump but skip the valley jump. If you can get the first jump right so you land at the lower door, you should be able to do the stair jump at 51, so you can get (partial) crit heals by 41. If you plan for crit heals on the second jumper, this could work out better and allow a 300 + 300 jump rather than 300 + 250. I'll have to try this one out.

I just wanted to note that this thread is rediculous(ly awesome).

Going by the Pure Esports method Jaeger posted earlier in the thread both sollies skip the stair jump. Unfortunately the later instructions are a little bit unclear (which raised ground?) so I'm unsure just how healthy the jumping sollies will be following that method.

There are basically two levels of ground in the valley area..
The ground-ground, the lowest part of the map, and then the elevated area closer to the closet.
Like if you came out of the closet, and dropped down off of that perch right outside of the closet, you will land on the 'elevated area', then drop down again and you are on the ground-ground.

It's only effective if the enemy demoman doesn't call your demo jumping.

yea good point. but should the team who uses valley depend on if the demo can catch the demo jumping or is there a more effective way to know for sure you wont been seen.

i guess going spy or something and trying to get the pick on someone (mainly medic)

You could try a blind, long range jarate toss. I don't have the faintest idea of the time it takes for a sniper to get into positon to toss jarate over the bridge.

You could try a blind, long range jarate toss. I don't have the faintest idea of the time it takes for a sniper to get into positon to toss jarate over the bridge.
Unless your sniper is really good, the two scouts will be much better for the mid fight, gives your demoman more coverage from the opposing team scouts.

Unless your sniper is really good, the two scouts will be much better for the mid fight, gives your demoman more coverage from the opposing team scouts.

True, but it's jarate for christ's sake (Hahahahehe I made a punny). I'm very inexperianced in competitive play, only a few matches under my belt.

What classes other than the normal classes can get to the train through the house by 9:40? Can a pyro? He may be able to push them off your train, buying your team some time. Could a heavy come to the fight late but flank them by taking the far left route? Or is that just too slow?

Or is there anyway way other than demospam that can be used to disrupt their valley before the first soldier jumps? It looks to me that the problem is the soldiers don't need to worry about taking damage before they jump. Maybe long range dual scout pistols? Who is guarding their medic when both soldiers jump?

In my opinion the valley is the best way for soldiers to go because you don't need to walk through a tight chokepoint. I guess it seperates your medic from the big healthpack, but it gives you many more attacking options. It looks to me that the shape of the badlands mid fight changed from train to train, to a side to side fight.

Spotting a valley rush is easy if your team is experienced, hard if your scouts are distracted. As soon as you see it make sure to get to mid faster preferably letting your scouts go after the medic combo or what's left of it after they jump, and the rest handle the jumpers, or even your roamer counter-jump onto the enemy medic with the scouts helping him if you get there faster. I've seen this countered this way before I'll post a demo on Youtube if I see it happen again. However if the jumpers get on your crate and spam you in house, you can try to fall back to choke and hopefully the scouts did work on the enemy medic letting you push out again.