Epic Steel (8/25/08)

**Hephador** · 08-26-2008, 04:23 AM

Kudos to everyone who played in the two awesome rounds of Steel tonight. Two of the craziest and most fun rounds I have ever played on that map. Niether team won but god knows it wasn't for lack of trying.

First round Blue nearly gets shutout at A, then makes overtime last about 5 minutes as we constantly tried to cap D and/or E. We'd start to cap E, get pushed back, but then start capping D...getting that far enough along to start trying E again. Came within a second of capping D at one pioint before we got cleared out by a pyro or something and finally lost.

Second round, Red got rolled pretty quickly through C but then we got the defense going and just started fending off caps of D and E left and right. Then right near the end as time is close to expiring, Blue makes a massive push to E and is within a second or two of capping it when someone from Red manages to defend it and the cap indicator dropped all the way down and Red managed to hold even though at that point we only had one player left alive. It was awesome!

So congrats again to everyone who played two great rounds on a really fun map!!

**jollyeskimo** · 08-26-2008, 06:08 AM

Yeah that was pretty epic as far as defenses go... I kept wondering how the OT wasn't over since the cap timer looked like it zeroed out, and then a couple of attackers would step on right at the last second.

thundeer · 08-26-2008, 07:24 AM

The 1st round was definitely much more dramatic, but the 2nd round was crazy intense as well. He's not kidding when he said the overtime lasted minutes. I had time to go to a point, stand on it for a few seconds, die, and respawn in THREE TIMES afterwards, all 3 times running to one of the 2 points (D or E) to try and cap it again, while somehow everyone else on the team did the exact same thing. No there wasn't any real coordination (at least on blu XD), just people not giving up, watching their HUDs and scrambling to the points, maybe a shout of 'no one at D!' or 'they're on E!' and you would just watch the cap point icons flicker furiously, with 2 or 3 last second saves before red sat on both points for the win. Great great round!

**Beatnik** · 08-26-2008, 08:12 AM

Wasn't there for this, but we had a decent round of relatively solid teamwork on Steel last night which also had some pretty dramatic/epic moments, most of which ended up me sending others to certain death in the pit, or myself getting sent downward.

Cool thread. Love to hear about epic games in the forums.

**BaneII** · 08-26-2008, 09:13 AM

Remember back when Steel was first introduced and all the complaining about the map? Anyway, that was a very good but annoying round at the end. While playing Medic on RED, a number of times I had to run straight onto D and E with my Blutsauger blazing to stop the capture. A few times I would run into a crowd of BLU and come out alive at the end with the CP clear. I think it had more to do with the look of disbelief on their faces at what this crazy RED Medic was doing.

Unfortunately, after all that work we lost.

When I was on BLU, I switched to Sniper at the end to take down the RED heavies (looking at you thundeer) who kept clearing the CP's. So I go to A's battlements to cover E. Now the time is coming to a close and I don't see any teammates near E and no opposition either. Everyone is at D. I yell for someone to go and capture E. Then there comes a mass of BLU to E and RED comes in to knock them off. As the fight commences, I start by taking down a Medic. Then as the brawl continues, I put down a Soldier. I proceed to take down all of the 3 remaining defenders standing on E. As the smoke clears and the shell casings cease to fall, as I have put down 5 targets in a row with 5 shots in the best sniping of my TF2 career, I look out onto a totally empty CP E. No RED or BLU in sight as I call for someone to get on the point (not time enough for me to there from the battlement). Then the seconds run out as no one is close enough to reach a CP. That was a downer to say the least.

Good game, though.

P.S. Hephador - your colors are reversed. RED defends and BLU attacks on that map.

P.S.S. Also learned today that you can get out of the pit by walking up a pipe. Just noticed that today when I got knocked off E but landed on the catwalk.

**icky** · 08-26-2008, 03:14 PM

I was only there for the second round of this, but it was fantastic, and it was the second fantastic round of steel in two days. It is truly one of the best maps now that most people know it well.

For me, the glory of this round happened right at the end. I was on Red, and we were doing a pretty good job holding D and E, but with time winding down, Blue pushed on to E with a good force. Almost everyone on Red was down, and E was getting capped in a hurry. I ran like mad from my post at D to flank them. I knew it was hopeless because there were at least 3 Blue on the point and only a few seconds, but I rounded the corner to give it a sporting try, frantically dispatching a demoman on the way. To my delighted surprise, I came around that corner and found that several of my teammates had spawned and were blasting Blue off the point. With only a sliver of time left before the cap, we got rid of the last guy and held for the celebration.

luuser · 08-26-2008, 03:57 PM

I was lurking around E at the very end of the last round but staying clear out of Bane's line of sight after seeing him snipe the last guy off the point. Luckily no one else was around to make a grab for E.

Can't believe we didn't get D in the first round, as it was very nearly capped until some pyro decides to ruin our day. damn pyros.

**Tybalt** · 08-26-2008, 04:18 PM

Bane, we won as Red. ;] Your medic-ing was awesome.

Pretty epic rounds both, but would have been nice to win as Blue as well. I thought we had it for sure after rolling the first three caps so quickly.

**BHack** · 08-26-2008, 06:20 PM

Ah yes, steel... missed the rounds but had some good games on it before.

I remember when I first queued this one up way back when. "This map sucks, it's so confusing!" "I keep getting stuck on the geometry.. wah wah!" "BHack, why would you load this abortion, I hope you die in a car fire!" I thought it was an awesome idea for a map so I was saddened by these comments.

It is funny, we had this map very early on in its release - played it a few times, some people complained. We stopped playing it entirely for a month or two, then for some mysterious reason Beatnik suddenly took renewed interest in the map and got it back into some primetime play where it eventually made it into our rotation.

Now Valve endorses it and it is a hit! Fishbus even got paid for it!

The moral of this story is please temper your initial reaction to a new map by understanding that unfamiliarity does not equal bad design.

**Tarheel** · 08-26-2008, 06:27 PM

Incredible game, especially for how our side started both segments. I was running "decoy" to start with on offense, scout-rushing to E and trying to draw off some defenders from A. I kept running into a sizable group, so figured A would be going down "any time now" if 3-4 defenders were back at E. Not the case. Switched over to help cap A, and it didn't look good until the timer was almost out. The last desperation push finally held.

Much the same for D and E, and then near the end we managed to throw a few bodies on the point to get overtime, which lasted a ridiculous amount of time due to us always getting a group on D and or E, but never quite enough. We had to be literally within a second of capping D that one time.

After that epic struggle, we got steamrolled pretty well at the start, and I thought how it was going to suck to struggle like we did and for the opposition to have an easy time of it. Maybe it just took us a while to recover from the overtime shock, I dunno. Not quite sure how we held, but we did. Thought we were toast when I got sniped by Bane at E, then saw several others go down in quick succession. Luckily no other Blues ever showed up to take advantage. I actually managed to stay alive right at the end but got sucked in by the rocket, so we had more than one guy alive, but not by much.

Funniest moment of the night for me was seeing two pyros at E blowback each other, sending both over the side simultaneously.