Friday, September 28, 2012

The Burn Ward

The Burn Ward
Level 10 Flamethrower
Victims share healing as long as they're on fire
-66% afterburn damage
Fire does not extinguish over time
Fire extinguishes on death

You might recognize this as another one of my Injury Update weapons. It was one of the better ones and I felt it deserved its own post and some concept art. If you're wondering what the deal is with the concept art, the little radar dish is supposed to be the receiving antenna that heals you whenever enemies heal themselves.

There was some concern when I initially unveiled this that enemies extinguishing themselves with healing would circumvent any use this thing had. After all, most forms of healing cure the fire debuff. So your earned healing would usually be limited to a medium medkit. There were also concerns that this would discourage enemies from healing burning enemies (unlikely given the busy battlefields of TF2).

I wanted the whole thing to encapsulate a very complicated sort of strategy. Enemies know that as long as they're on fire they're vulnerable to crit combos and their heals also heal the enemy, but killing the Pyro will sooth their pain. Entice enemies into attacking you from weak positions. The main problem here is conveying how differently this kind of fire works--making the unique nuances visible without breaking game readability.

Let me know what you think here, or on the related SPUF forum thread.

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