- Health: 175
- Speed: 93%
- Type:
Defense - Special Ability: Pipe Bomb Jump
Weapons
The demoman's loadout makes him a flexible class, devasting at midrange combat, capable at long range combat and well equipped to deal with sentries. His one weakness is close range, he cannot deal much damage at point blank without killing himself as well.
Primary Weapons
- Grenade Launcher - Clip Size: 6 - Reserve Ammo: 16 - Reloaded one at a time
The grenade launcher is a powerful weapon that also deals splash damage. On a direct hit the grenade will explode immediately. Against weaker classes, like scouts, a single grenade can sometimes score a one hit kill. If you miss, the grenade will bounce. Grenades have a 3 second fuse. Unless you have good aim, the grenade launcher isn't very good in close combat and may end up killing you in the process. The best use of this weapon is to fire it into a fray of enemies. This weapon is great against Heavies, as they are slow and easy to hit, but against fast classes such as Scout and Medic you will have better luck using the Demo's secondary weapon. It should be noted that although this weapon has splash, it does very little damage unless the enemy is standing on top of the grenade.
Secondary Weapons
- Sticky Bomb Launcher - Clip Size: 8 - Reserve Ammo: 24 - Reloaded one at a time
The sticky launcher fires Sticky Bombs which can stick to any surface and can be detonated at any time. Three sticky bombs can take out most enemies, including sentry guns. The Demoman is great for taking out multiple sentry guns with the help of an Ubercharge. Sticky bombs have various uses, such as trapping a commonly traveled area, protecting the intelligence briefcase or control point, pipe bomb jumping, or even used offensively. Placing sticky bombs where they are hard to see, such as on a wall or ceiling, will increase the chance of an enemy running into your trap. Offensively using stickies is called "stickythrowing", which is where the demoman fires a sticky directly at an enemy and detonates it midair, making it impossible to dodge for most classes (unlike grenades). Because you cannot detonate stickies until they have spent at least 1 second out of the launcher, stickythrowing is impossible at close range.
Sticky Jumping works like the Rocket Jump. Place a sticky beneath you, then jump as you explode the bomb. Unlike rocketjump, stickyjumping deals almost 50% damage to the demoman. On the bright side, it propels you much, much further and faster than rocket jumps. Sticky jumping will allow you to get to massive heights and get you across long distances in no time.
Melee Weapons
- Bottle
Unless you have extremely good aim with the Grenade Launcher, your trusty bottle will be your only hope in close combat. It does the same amount of damage as any other normal melee weapon does. On a critical hit or when you kill someone with it, the bottle will shatter and look broken; this does not affect gameplay.
Using the Demoman
A skilled Demoman can be monumentally annoying to enemies. The grenade launcher can kill a full health heavy in 3 seconds, and the uses of the sticky launcher are endless. A well placed trap can completely close off a route into your base, stickythrowing can beat any class midrange, sentries can easily be edged and stickyjumping (with the help of a medic and health kits) can get you to the point faster than a scout.
The Demoman has a lack of direct weapons, so is more suited for a defensive role than an offensive one unless you are good with both your weapons. A good demoman on offense is critical. The Demoman, Spy, Soldier, and Heavy are usually the only classes that can take down a sentry without the use of an Ubercharge. Furthermore, on offense, the Demoman can be a real pain to deal with, if that demoman is any good. You must be able to use it as a way to set traps, with both of his weapons: one prime example is on payload games, in which a good demoman can both serve as a good protection of the cart and a strong forward offensive line, with his ability to easily destroy an engineer's gun turret without having to pass through it with the cart. Also, be sure to retreat when your ammo is low, as in-fighting reloads are just not possible as a demoman.
The demoman has 2 main problems, however: He has little close range ability and his weapons take a long time to reload. Fully reloading all your weapons can actually take longer than respawning in some cases.
Defeating Demomen
The demoman's main weakness is point blank range. Therefore, any class that can get in a good position has a fair chance of defeating the demoman just with melee.
- Scouts are agile enough to dodge both stickies and grenades and get point blank. Once you get there, remember to circle around behind the demoman, or else he may gib you with a grenade.
- Soldiers are decent counters for demomen Although they will be trumped mid and long range, soldiers can often rocketjump into short range, giving them a massive edge over the demoman.
- Pyros are only good against demomen when surprise is on the Pyro's side. As with the scout, circle behind the demoman. Although you cannot be killed in one hit, a grenade will still take a good chunk out of your health.
- Demomen can fight other demomen too. A head on duel will either be decided by stickythrowing or grenade aim, depending on the distance engaged at. If a demoman sneaks up behind another, plop a sticky next to him (or in his path, if he's moving) then swap to grenades and detonate the sticky after your grenade hits.
- Heavies are a fairly even match for demomen, however, whether you win or lose the fight will come down to the demoman's skill, not yours.
- Other than sneaking up behind them, engineers have no effective way to fight the demoman. If he starts firing stickybombs at your sentry, abandon it and rush him with the shotgun.
- Medics have difficulty fighting demomen on their own, but patients that they heal can effectively fight demomen at mid range. Although stickythrowing does good damage, it does it fairly slowly and about half of it will be healed back by the time the next bomb arrives.
- Snipers have the advantage over demomen at long range, as he is fairly slow compared to other classes. Watch out though, he may fire a sticky at you from long range.
- Like all matchups, a spy should just get behind a demoman and backstab. Against demomen who can't stickythrow, you may be able to revolver them mid range.