Team Fortress 2 – How to Fight Every Class as Pyro (and Maybe Win Sometimes)

This is a guide on how to 1v1 each class as Pyro.

Scout

Note: Credit goes to A Bit Scary Innit

Scouts can be hard to take out as Pyro, they’re faster than you and deal damage fast.

Hunting Scouts is like hunting deer, only the deer has a shotgun.

The best way to kill a Scout as Pyro is to catch him unawares and burn him enough to kill with afterburn (a few seconds of constant fire should do) and then finish with a shotgun blast. Flare crits will do a lot too.

Generally you want to avoid fighting Scout in open areas, he will stay out of your range and chip away from range, try and catch him indoors and be aware that his scattergun can kill you very fast.

Soldier

Soldier has one generally agreed upon counter: airblast. Airblast is a very powerful tool against Soldiers if used well, but don’t spam it without thinking or you’ll achieve nothing but losing all your ammo.

Aside from the obvious, a good tactic for dealing with Soldier can be to get so close they blow themselves up, most Soldier mains have a limit of one thought per minute and “shoot gun” is usually the winning candidate.

Trolldiers are usually easy, just airblast them up and away before roasting them. If you really struggle with them, use the reserve shooter and skeet shoot them out of the sky, maybe even juggle them with airblasts to get more shots in.

Pyro

Other Pyros are easy; they’re basically brainless and will likely just run at you holding M1. Shotguns are your friend here, especially the panic attack.

Watch out for the dragon’s fury, it can do a lot of damage very fast.

The neon annihilator can be very powerful if the enemy is stupid enough to follow you underwater.

Keep enemy Pyro’s at a distance and aim to hit them with lots of burst damage

Demoman

Demoman is an easy one really; get as close as you can and make him panic, but beware his pipes and traps. Try to stay out of sight and flank him.

Demoknight is a cakewalk as long as you have airblast, but beware of him sneaking up from behind.

Heavy

Heavy is a pretty tough contender for Pyro, his primary will shred you even up close and he takes a while to burn down, with his food items saving him from suicide rushes often.

Avoid Heavy where you can and try to land flare crits from a distance or get a flank with the phlog or backburner, if you must take him head on then don’t expect to live long.

Using the map is a viable strategy, pitfalls and sawblades will make short work of anyone, no matter how tough.

Be wary of Heavies using the killing gloves of boxing, you do not want to give them free crits by dying in melee like a fool.

Engineer

Engie is a hard counter to Pyro, or more specifically, his level 3 sentrygun is. Sentries will be pretty hard to deal with provided they’re placed well, but here are some tips to give you a chance.

Using corners or ledges can help you hit a sentry without being shot, but they may be placed in the open to negate this, if so you should look for an angle where you can chip it with your shotgun. Be aware that an engineer going turtle with his sentry and dispenser can be a nightmare to unstick.

Sentry rockets can be deflected, this isn’t amazingly useful but may help you kill it faster.

Level 1 and mini sentries can often be rushed and destroyed without getting killed, but you will lose lots of health.

Combat engineers are not too hard to deal with; they run as fast as you but have 25 to 50 less health and are not fireproof. Like them you have a shotgun but your primary should do. Destroy minis as soon as they are placed but focus on the engineer primarily, he is more dangerous.

Dispensers can mitigate your flames, so don’t waste your life trying to burn enemies who are near one, setting them on fire and dying will only waste their time and your life.

Medic

Medic alone is easy fodder, unless he gets a random crit because Medic should totally be able to do that. The vaccinator will make him a pain to kill so pack a shotgun.

The third degree should counter him, but it doesn’t and is trash so don’t even bother unless you want a meme kill.

The real issue with Medic is his buddy, who becomes a much harder target with him behind them, so consider getting some friends of your own, otherwise try and deflect his Soldier bf’s rockets into the Med, then finish the Solider off. Taunting after is mandatory as this will make the Soldier bf angry, causing him to yell at his Med gf, possibly spurring a divorce. This is tactically advantageous.

Sniper

At long range you have no hope, use flares to offset his aim and try to stay in cover.

Up close it should be a free kill unless he uses the jarate and bushwacka, or gets a crit.

If he uses the darwin’s danger shield, be sure to call him slurs in text chat, any kind will do.

Spy

Spy is your main victim, they will often go down easy but don’t get cocky. Be careful of stairstabs and other trickstabs, remember that he has a gun just in case he does too.

Spycheck often and turn around frequently, eventually he might even change classes.

Unsap buildings with the homewrecker if you’re dealing with an active spy, this will undermine his efforts pretty badly and helps the team a lot, especially teleporters.

Remember that fake deaths drop fake ammo, if you kill a spy you should pick up the ammo box immediately after, if you get no ammo from it then the spy is still alive, so be sure to tell your team he has the dead ringer and check the area.

Keep an eye out for ammo boxes, building gibs and health packs vanishing mysteriously, they have probably been taken by an invisible spy.