Play a Sniper in Team Fortress 2

Sniper is the long range Australian assassin of Team Fortress 2. Snipers generally play the role of support but a skilled sniper can play effective offense and defense. Armed with his infamous Sniper Rifle, he can plug bullets into anyone's head from 500 meters away and stop every opposing threat to his objective. Alongside is his S.M.G., which helps him hold up enough health to land a final blow with his Kukri, a long katana useful for chopping up Spies.

Steps

  1. Know your tools to survival. Every Sniper starts with three stock weapons: a Sniper rifle, which can hold 25 bullets (Primary), a mid-ranged 25/75 SMG (Secondary) and his backup Kukri (Melee). Alongside those are other weapons you can obtain through achievements and item drops. The achievement weapons unlockable for the sniper are: The Huntsman - A bow which shoots arrow projectiles(Primary), Jarate - a throwable jar of urine (Secondary) and the Razorback - A shield which prevents back-stabs. If you are far away from combat, and will not use a knife, take the Razorback as extra protection. (Secondary).
  2. Know what your Sniper Rifle is an how to use it. The Sniper Rifle is a powerful weapon with a small charge-up time. and its main use is for picking off enemies at a good distance. This weapon is very powerful and can be lethal with one shot. Remember, aim for the head of your enemies. Depending on how much you have charged up before a shot, the rifle will do 150-450 dmg on a headshot, or 50-250 on a bodyshot.

  3. Get your technique right. You should generally stay unscoped and avoid staying zoomed in. This is so that you can be more aware and observe the battlefield. Additionally, scoping will limit your sight and decrease your movement speed. A Sniper who doesn't know what's going on is vulnerable to Spy backstabs. Staying unscoped, you can use any of the four techniques below, elaborated on in the next four steps: No Scoping, Hard Scoping, Strafe Scoping and Quickscoping.
  4. Learn to No Scope. No Scoping, also known as hip-firing, is firing the gun without zoom, from the hip, and is useful to pick off any close or fast moving enemies, such as scouts. An unscoped shot will do 50 dmg, no mater if you hit the enemy's head, chest, or boots. If you think that scoping is dangerous in a situation, you can help your team out and fire from the hip to potentially assist in killing any enemies.
  5. Learn to hard-scope. The longer you are zoomed in, the more damage your shots can do. A meter will charge every second you are zoomed in. When it is full, you will do the most damage. If you headshot an enemy as soon as you zoom in, the bullet will deal about 150 dmg. This is enough to kill scouts, pyros, medics, snipers, or spies. This is an effective and easy way, along with no-scoping, to take down some of the high damage classes with 1 shot. A fully-charged headshot will deal 450 damage to the enemy player. This will be enough to kill any class, including a heavy charged by a medic. Sniping can be done by aiming at an entrance and waiting for an enemy to walk into your crosshair.

    When you're zoomed in, a dot will show on whatever you are aiming at. Your enemies may see this and avoid your shot. You may want to aim a bit to the side or above the doorway where the enemies will come out, where the dot is not visible and then swiftly move your aim towards the enemy to surprise them. Hard Scoping may be effective, but it is frowned upon by more experienced players, especially enemy snipers, since it takes the least skill. However, this will kill any class on the enemy team and will rack up points for you in the game.
  6. Learn to strafe-scope. Strafe-scoping is taking advantage of strafing (moving left and right with the A and D keys) while keeping your crosshair at the level of enemy heads to assist aiming. This technique is great against enemies while on flat surfaces, particularly enemy snipers trying to pick you off. Strafing will allow you to move constantly while still firing at the enemy, making it harder for enemies to shoot you. Most players keep their crosshair at head level and zoom in only when it is near an enemy. This technique is great for popping a quick, uncharged headshot on an enemy, forcing them to run back to base to avoid dying.
  7. Learn to quickscope. Quickscoping is taking advantage of good muscle memory and is the technique used by pros. At the sight of an enemy, quickly move your crosshair towards the enemy's head and zoom in. As you right click, quickly slide your mouse towards the enemy's head. It also helps you use your mouse in conjunction with the A and D keys (strafing) to help increase accuracy. Players may take time to pick up quickscoping but once you know how to do it, it'll be extremely useful. By using quickscoping, a skilled sniper can fight close to mid combat, altering the flow of the game.
  8. Use the SMG for mid-range shots. The SMG is adequate for shooting enemies at a somewhat close distance. It has a very fast rate of fire but is quite weak. Use it when there is an oncoming enemy who is too close to snipe.
  9. Use the Kukri at point-blank distances. While, like all melee weapons, the Kukri is fun and satisfying to use, it is somewhat weak and should only be used when the other weapons can't be used or you know that the enemy has low health.
  10. Think strategically. Know where you're most effective. As the Sniper, remember that there are certain places you should stay out of. Crowded, small rooms are probably not a great environment in which to use this weapon. Always find a secluded (preferably elevated) area to use this weapon. Make sure you are hidden from enemy Spies and Snipers at any time. Furthermore, you should try to avoid close-combat and attempt long-range combat since, at 125, the Sniper's health is quite low.

  11. Know Your Enemy. You should scan the battlefield and note the often predictable movement patterns and strategies of the enemy team. In Payload maps, if you are defending look at for the track,and position yourself where you can see an long stretch. The BLU team will be pushing the payload right into your crosshair. Likewise, if you are on BLU in payload maps look up in the hills and at the end of tunnels for enemy snipers. As a Sniper, your biggest threats are enemy Spies and Snipers. Remember to un-zoom and look around to see if any possible Spies lurking around or Snipers aiming at you from another direction.
  12. Enemy Spy! Always be on full alert! Make sure you often look around you so that you don't get attacked by a spy. If your back is turned to a spy, they can easily backstab you, killing you instantly. Many spies often act very suspiciously so spy check players by shooting or attacking any players coming near you. Even if your back is against a wall or you are wearing the razorback, an enemy spy could easy take out his revolver or just swipe his knife at you and kill you. Use your ears; the cloaking and disguising sound effect of a spy is often easily audible and will alert you or any nearby spies. You can easily discover if someone is a spy if you cannot walk through them. If you can walk through them, then it's not an enemy spy: stop wasting your time. If you are unsure about a teammate, ask them in chat to fire their weapon. Enemy spies can't fire weapons without losing their disguise. If they don't respond, shoot them or run at them, swinging your Kukri. If they run away, they are defiantly spy. Call your team on them or just shoot them yourself.
  13. Enemy Sniper! Remember that unseen enemy Snipers can snipe you at any time! Additionally, you can mash the WASD keys and walk around and jump around. If you jump (space) and crouch (ctrl) at the same time, you will jump higher than without crouching. In mid-jump, you can tap your crouch (ctrl) key rapidly two times. This will make your character move up and down so quickly that enemy Snipers will most of the time fail to headshot you.

  14. Support your teammates! However fun it may be just looking out for yourself and sniping only at your enemies, your main goal is to help your teammates, not just yourself! When you see an enemy in combat with one of your teammates, your job is to try to snipe the enemy so you can help your teammate gain points and survive! Don't waste time check for nonexistent spies and especially don't play Sniper vs Sniper minigames. If you only snipe at enemy Snipers, you won't be helping your team very much at all, as it isolates you from the main game (as you are instead playing a 'minigame' of just seeing if you can compete with the enemy Snipers in killing them). This is notorious in maps like 2Fort, where the battlements on each side are used by Snipers to play the minigame, constantly competing against each other to see who's the better Sniper. Avoiding this minigame and actually helping out your team mates can be as simple as going to other sniping positions where enemy Snipers are less likely to see you, and doing something useful such as killing Medic + Heavy combos or helping out in general combat.
  15. Know your unlocks and how to use them.
    • The Huntsman is used for mid-ranged combat, and can do massive amounts of damage. The Huntsman is a bow which shoots quick projectile arrows. It takes one second to charge up, where fully charged shots usually kill or cripple weak classes like Scouts. However, if you charge your bow for more than 5 seconds, the accuracy and damage of the shot will be extremely low. Headshots are instant critical hits, and can usually instantly kill most classes. The Huntsman replaces the Sniper Rifle in the primary slot. Wanting to be very annoying. You can spam fully charged shots towards the enemy, hoping that they kill. This infamous technique which is frowned upon is dubbed the "Lucksman".
    • The Razorback is a shield used to protect you from infamous backstabbing Spies. It protects you from a single backstab. When a spy attempts to backstab you while you have it equipped, your shield will break and the attacking spy will not be able to attack or cloak for about 2 seconds. The Razorback is one of the side-grades for the SMG in the secondary slot. Although this may seem useful, many spies may take advantage of their revolvers to take you out instead of their knives. Therefore, you should consider carefully before equipping it.
    • Jarate, the Jar-Based Karate, is a throwable jar of piss. The jar can be thrown at enemies to coat them in urine, making anything that hits them Mini-Crits, which does 35% more damage than normal. You can assist your teammates by coating the enemy so that your team deals more damage. When used on spies, it has an additional effect, allowing you to see them when they are using their invisibility cloak. It has one use per charge, and it recharges after 20 seconds. Note that it can instantly be retrieved from your Respawn Room's Resupply cabinet (which implies that, for whatever reason, the Sniper keeps an infinite number of jars of his urine in the supply cabinet). The Jarate replaces the SMG in the secondary weapon slot.
    • The Tribalman's Shiv can be used to identify Spies, cloaked or otherwise. It is a melee weapon which causes hit enemies to bleed for six seconds. The affected enemy will also be visibly bleeding to other players (The bleeding is less noticeable than being set on fire, however); an enemy Spy will be shown bleeding as well, whether they are cloaked or in disguise. So, The Tribalman's Shiv can be used as a Spy-check for Snipers. The Tribalman's Shiv serves as a replacement for the Kukri.

Tips

  • The head shot is lethal with one hit on the Medic, Scout, Engineer, Sniper and Spy. To kill a Heavy, Soldier, Demoman, or Pyro, charge up your rifle before you go for the head shot. It takes 3.3 seconds to fully charge the rifle, although this usually isn't necessary.
  • If you crouch at the bottom of a ramp to an open area, you will be invisible to your enemy until they run up to the top of the ramp. They won't see you until their head comes into view. Take your shot quickly.
  • A fully charged Sniper Rifle shot along with a headshot will kill any player in a single shot (unless they are invulnerable).
  • Don't forget to crouch if you have partial cover, reducing your chances of getting spotted and shot.
  • Enemy constructions are also targets; a Sniper can take down a Sentry from great distances if there is a sight line. A fully charged shot will take down a Level 1 Sentry instantly.
  • Your rifle puts a laser dot on your target, so aiming at walls visible to the enemy may give your presence away. You can see this dot in your scope, but there is no visible laser line, and your rifle does not glow.
  • To start, find a secluded, hard to see/reach spot to snipe, away from the main battle points.
  • No-scoping is difficult, so don't try unless you are really confident.
  • Spy-check any player that comes up behind you.
  • You can charge up a shot to increase the power; watch the bar in the bottom right of the screen.
  • When no scoping, headshots are not possible unless you are using the newly added "classic."

Warnings

  • Beware of scouts or any fast moving units as they may sneak up behind you or dodge the bullets you fire.
  • but you do have an smg so if they dodge sniper rounds fire at them.

Things You'll Need

  • A computer
  • A steam account

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