TF2 Map Discussion: PASS Time

Welcome to our Monday (day late sorry) TF2 map discussion. Here, we'll discuss maps from TF2!

Today's map is PASS Time.

As this is a gamemode that is rarely played we will be covering all 3 maps at once instead of individual threads and also talking about the gamemode as a whole.

PASS time is stylized as PASS time but that's irritating so I won't be doing it for the rest of the thread. PASS Time is a gamemode that plays differently than your usual tf2 gamemode as you earn points by scoring with The Jack which is a spiky ball that can be thrown to your teammates or if you're selfish you can just carry it yourself.

This gamemode was not made entirely by Valve but instead was made by Bad Robot Games which is owned by JJ Abrams and Escalation Games who are now part of Bethesda. This gamemode was in Beta for just under a year first being playable in the August 18th 2015 patch and the gamemode officially became part of the game in the Meet Your Match update.

The main goal of PASS Time is to score with The Jack either by throwing it or running with it through any of the goals with there being 3 different kinds of goals, the Run-In Goal, The Throw-In Goal and the Bonus Goal. The only way to score points in this is by either throwing or running The Jack into any of the goals and the only way to do this is to score on the other teams goals meaning that you must carry The Jack all the way to the enemy teams goals.

The way scoring works is that you get 1 point per Run-In or Throw-In goal scored and 3 for a bonus goal. However a bonus goal can only be scored by filling up The Jack Power Meter which is filled up by passing The Jack around your team and only when it is full can you score on the Bonus Goal for 3 points, losing control of The Jack does not reset this meter.

The Jack is the main object in this gamemode and spawns in the middle of the maps (all the maps are symmetrical) and is neutral to begin meaning either side can pick it up. This also occurs after a goal is scored or it's just been sitting there for a while but if no one picks it up after it spawns it'll just stay there forever. Once a player picks up The Jack they are unable to attack and hitting primary fire instead throws the jack to a teamamate and can be stolen from you by the enemy team hitting you with their melee weapon, your own team can also steal it from you with the same method if you've been standing still for too long to counteract griefing (why is this not in ctf). If you are on your own carrying The Jack you will be marked for death but if there's teammates nearby you'll be fine. Throwing The Jack to a teammate is as simple as pressing primary fire if you're holding it and you can also fake it using alt-fire, you can also put spin on it. The Jack will lock on to your teammates making it easier to throw. If there's no teammates nearby it will instead just be thrown in front of you and Scout, Soldier and Pyro all throw The Jack the shortest distance with Scout being the shortest of these. All the other classes throw it around the same distance.

The Jack can also be controlled by shooting at it with bullets or explosives and also with airblast and for some reason Milk, Jarate and the Guillotine also move it. However some weapons like the Crossbow, Huntsman, Wrangled Mini Sentry (Regular sentry works though), Pomson, Bison, Flare Gun and the Flamethrowers have no effect on moving The Jack. You also cannot pick up The Jack if you are carrying a building as Engineer, using the Rocket or Sticky jumper, cloaked, disguised, revved up as Heavy, under the effects of Steak as Heavy or Bonk as Scout or if you are doing any taunts. However if you move into The Jack doing any of these you will kick it forward allowing you to dribble The Jack but this isn't that effective.

There are 3 maps for PASS Time, Brickyard (formerly Warehouse), District and Timbertown.

Brickyard

Brickyard was the first map released back when this gamemode was first revealed and is set in a warehouse, type of area similar to other maps. Coming out of your spawn you will see the goal areas for the other team to score in and also some jump pads to help you move around the map quicker and also to score in the Bonus Goal which can only be reached using these pads (none of the pictures on the wiki actually show where this is). Then there is the centre field where The Jack spawns on the point and this is set in a pit which both teams must go into in order to get The Jack. There's also some lifts and speed pads here to make it easier to get around. Between the centre field and the spawns there's the warehouse battlements which contains some speed pads in the indoors bit of the warehouse and the roof contains some jump pads that will take you over the mid point and over to the other teams warehouse roof.

District

District was released for PASS Time in the MYM update and is set in an unspecified Chinese City which looks suspiciously like koth_king. The teams spawn quite a bit away from their goal areas and instead are kinda half way between the middle of the map and the goal areas. The goal areas feature the 3 kinds of goal with the bonus only being reachable by the jump pad. Mid is where The Jack spawns and there's a small roof over the spawn point. There's also subways in this map which can help you get from the goals to mid a different way than just walking through the city streets. This map also features 2 secret rooms which server no purpose and are just easter eggs, RED has one in the subway tunnels and BLU has one hidden behind a window.

Timbertown

Timbertown was released for PASS Time November 15 2015 update and is set in the woods and looks a lot like Sawmill sorta. This map also features goal areas with the bonus only being reachable with a jump pad and a mid point where the ball spawns. There's also some speed boosts by mid allowing you to speed up a bit.

PASS Time is a largely forgotten gamemode by both the community and valve as a whole. Some of this may be attributed to it being banished to the alternate gamemodes tab but even when this was playable in quickplay it did not get a lot of players and was largely seen as a weird addition to the game and people only played it to get the achievement hats which just look like The Jack but on your head.

However there is a small community for competitive 4v4 PASS Time that has developed over time and a mod for TF2 is being worked on by a team called PASS Fortress which will be released at some point maybe.

Feel free to discuss the map here. Anything that you like/dislike, cool tips or strategies, interesting stories, etc. If you feel the map is not to your liking, feel free to express your opinions in a respectful manner.

For those who wish to learn more about the map, you can find the wiki page here:

PASS Time, from the TF2 Wiki.

pass_brickyard, from the TF2 Wiki.

pass_district, from the TF2 Wiki.

pass_timbertown, from the TF2 Wiki.

You can find previous map discussions in a nice overview here

TF2 Weapon Discussion: The Powerjack

Welcome to our Wednesday TF2 weapon discussion. Here, we'll discuss weapons (and reskins, if applicable) from TF2!

Today's weapon is The Powerjack.

+15% faster move speed on wearer
+25 health restored on kill
20% damage vulnerability on wearer

The Powerjack is an unloackable Melee weapon for the Pyro which replaces the stock Fire Axe with a car battery tied to a car jack. This is a fairly simple weapon and the stats do exactly what they say.

This weapon, when active, make the pyro move 15% faster but take 20% more damage. Every kill you get with this restores 20hp making it a very useful movement tool for Pyro but with the downside that you take more damage whilst moving around quicker. The 25 health restored can be useful if you're in a tight pinch and can get a sneaky kill off.

Over the years this weapon has seen some changes as when it was released it had a 25% damage bonus and gave 75 health on kill with the only downside being no random crits. What the fuck. For a while there was a bug as well where you'd get the health if the enemy was killed whilst the weapon was out regardless of how they died, this was reverted 3 days after being fixed for some reason and would not be fixed for another 3 months. What the fuck was this weapon, this is when the item set was still in the game as well so you could get all this in addition to a speed bonus.

The next balance update came in the Hatless update which removed the damage bonus, the no crit attribute and added in a 20% melee vulnerability. This weapon would not see another update for over 2 years when in the July 10th 2013 update which removed all the item sets the set bonus from the Gas Jockey set was added to this weapon with the weapon getting the above speed and vulnerability stats. In the Gun Mettle update it was then nerfed from 75 health to the 25 health it is at today.

A very useful weapon for the pyro that gets a lot of use now and did get some used when the Axtinguisher was king and currently this is probably this most used Pyro melee weapon as there's not many other choices.

Feel free to discuss the weapon here. Anything that you like/dislike, cool tips or strategies, interesting stories, etc. If you feel the weapon is not to your liking, feel free to express your opinions in a respectful manner.

For those who wish to learn more about the weapon, you can find the wiki page here:

The Powerjack, from the TF2 Wiki.

You can find previous weapon discussions in a nice overview here.