Unlocking the Full Potential of the Air Strike

[@zenoooooo]

Install Raid for Free ✅ IOS/ANDROID/PC: clcr.me/R_Zeno and get a special starter pack with an Epic champion Chonoru 💥 Available only for new players for the next 30 days Promo codes: ✅ Use the Promo Code RAIDRONDA to get a bunch of helpful stuff. Available to ALL users: New and Old by February 28 ✅ Use the Promo Code READY4RAID to get great pre-anniversary bonuses. Available for New users only by February 28 *Note that only 1 Promo code can be used within 24hours

[@endruv_2287]

I am so sorry you had to shill this

[@Team_Fortress2]

May zeno’s, L’s be many and his bitches be few.

[@conradmezrus]

Aww, you finally sold out. I'm so proud of you, my little capitalist piggy E>

[@casiooooooo]

thoughts on the blog post?

[@Samkidz]

You had one job

[@listertf2]

don't sleep on using the air strike to nuke sentry nests, i love starting with it on payload offense to destroy the base the other team spent all of set-up building (it's especially broken if you're in a party - no sentry nest can withstand a dozen rockets being fired all at once)

[@Vandagon8069]

Bro u have less than 4 rockets at the begging and u cant destroy the sentry neat if u spend it on rocket jumps

[@zenoooooo]

It's good at that! It's just not terribly interesting to talk about, kind of a boring but good utility

[@goldngamer1365]

@@Vandagon8069 ahem, ladies and gentlemen i present to you... **Drumroll** ... Killing people to increase your clip size

[@GeZz.]

Beggars Bazooka, does a better job

[@gubbebubbe4942]

@@GeZz. not at long range cuz of the spray

[@blacklight683]

the skill required to do airstrike/baggers with gunboats and garden is something i see a lot in videos but not in games cuz its hard af

[@nexusthenormie5578]

as someone who's attempted it? yeah it's a massive pain, and normal market gardening is already hard as fuck

[@somehau]

beggars bazooka still has a higher skill ceiling but stockcels will seethe regardless

[@mattthekiller9129]

Im a stockcel but i only use the rocket jumper to kill heavies 🤔

[@greenoftreeblackofblue6625]

Look at this joker

[@Dr._Heinz_Doofenshmirtz]

breaking news local nerd criticizes other people on the internet over their choice weapon in team fortress 2 he thinks he is the shit, but they arent even the fart

[@tiberiustiberius]

stockcels vs strikechads

[@somehau]

@@Dr._Heinz_Doofenshmirtz CLEARLY you are the soy wojak using the original and i am the chad wojak with my cool and awesome beggars bazooka

[@maxresdefault_]

I think about your old video on this weapon every time I use it. Gave it a spin the other day and had so much fun. It's literally an Eyelander with rockets

[@indigo1671]

Fun Fact: there are 2 types of bhops in TF2, those that preserve your speed and those that preserve your rocket jumping status and let you garden/airstrike/keep the jetpack state after jumping. The timing window for market gardner/airstrike bhops is random because they use a different check than speed preserving bhops. Speed preserving bhops always have a window of 1 tick (0.015 seconds) but market gardner/airstrike bhops have a window that can fluctuate from 0 to 7 ticks (impossible - 0.106 seconds) depending on your connection to the server. Generally, they have a more lenient window but they can sometimes just be impossible.

[@frog2098]

Good to know, it felt like bhop market gardens were random but I thought it was just because it was a 1 tick window so it was really tight

[@nadernad_]

so does your framerate still affect them?

[@indigo1671]

@@nadernad_ framerate doesnt affect physics in tf2

[@nadernad_]

@@indigo1671 ok but in the video it says something about your monitor and your framerate so like was that wrong or what

[@tsukiortu]

10:44 binding jump to mouse wheel makes it even easier just an fyi because when close to the ground just scroll and there's a good chance one of the jumps sent out that way is correctly timed

[@adinrichter6034]

that was the best raid sponsor i’ve ever seen, i could tell that you absolutely despised it yet you still get the money for sponsoring, kudos

[@zaezae64]

It's also very fun in MVM. With upgrades, it just makes the mobility even more insane which is extremely useful on the big open maps like bigrock. And ammo refill canteens let you do some extremely nutty barrages with it.

[@Doxxtrain]

'open' 'big rock' outside the cave, sure, but u dont play rottenburg?

[@zaezae64]

@@Doxxtrain Bigrock cave has plenty of space, and a relatively high ceiling. And yes, rottenburg air strike goes without saying, but 2city has some of the worst missions so I dont really care

[@Portal2Player]

I guess he's back in hibernation.

[@akdreamer6497]

Just like that He vanished

[@Purplecc_]

i miss him again

[@nilsmadej9091]

I love the air strike... Too bad I'm awful at rocket jumping. But even as a ground-walker with some simple jumps it still can be fun and effective. Thanks for spreading the good word of the air strike!

[@slovakthrowback3738]

Ive never tried air strike b-hops, but just because of how market garden b-hops works, Im pretty sure you dont actually need to hit it on 1/66th of a second; what that refers to are perfect b-hops, and those perserve your momentum, but as far as market garden b-hops work, they are far less precise While this is not 100%, the whistling sound you get while using the rocket jumper is a pretty good indication of if a b-hop counted for still being in the air (edit: this section is useless, since you already mentioned it lol) Also, if you wanna practice these, Ive found that offline servers make them totally, or practically impossible, so youll need to either turn on some fake latency through console commands (for me around 20-40 ping works well enough), or youll need to go on a real server

[@zenoooooo]

I had no idea there were two kinds of bhops! Honestly I thought they were all the same. Kinda bums me about the video now lol, but thank you for the informative comment! I'd pin it if I wasn't contractually obligated by Raid Shadow Legends to pin their comment lol

[@slovakthrowback3738]

@@zenoooooo It honestly doesn't change too much, other than the timing isn't as tight as you though, and that you don't need such a good PC/monitor

[@BunnerTime]

The Air Strike is bar none my favorite rocket launcher, and it's gotten to the point where I have dedicated Air Strike rollouts on MvM maps that can't be done with anything else. Still labbing out the Mannhattan rollout because you go maybe *too* fast out of spawn.

[@zenoooooo]

Madlad, labbing airstrike rollouts on PVE game modes lmao

[@revolt-gamingrevolutions8201]

Thanks, Man with Piss Breath

[@Birds_In_Crime]

this video puts you above other tf2 youtubers. very creative and meticulously perfected technique, well done, ill give this a shot next time i go on team frotress 2

[@fumothfan9]

When rick mays died i renamed my air strike after him. Honestly Air strikes aren underrated just underappreciated by players for several reasons: -8 fast rockets probably harder to use than direct hit -damage lowered on par with LL or DH from splash reduction. -slow build up time for 8 rockets -20 ammo makes it more down time than beggars bazooka But it has a lot of upsides as other soldier youtubers have shown -highest dps from 4 rockets landing in quick sucession plus extra destroy sentries faster than engies can repair -parachute was better but still good. Mostly because tf2 players never look up EVER. 😂 The one weapon the classic that encourages no scopes for it even has achievements snipers never use it. -8 rockets at once mean random crits are a higher chance -even at low damage from falloff the knockback is still insane meaning snipers heavies pyros scouts etc will have issues aiming or strafing. It is a beast in mvm so in pubs it really should excel more so against a smaller group of worse than bot players 😂 Bhopping and rocket jumps are nice but being an absolute menace dive bombing will never be beat. This is every soldier main's dream of dive bombing and unloading 8 crockets at a large group of enemy. Well there is but it requires hard work and braincells something they don't seem to wanna use all that often It will hinder you against enemy soldiers but compared to how many other classes you straight up counter it is worth it.

[@fumothfan9]

Valve making one of the reskin weapons the air strike really show how much faith and hard work they put into this weapon and it shows.

[@RealNick04]

6:33 Hearing you mention “gunboats” reminds of that one vid where you called them the “Gunbutts”. I think Im gonna do that rn. Also, Im glad you covered the bhopping part of using the air strike, but it has other uses in TF2 from personal experience: (Im a medic main and I use the scroll wheel) Scout: useless unless the BFB is reworked to remove double jumping Soldier: Air Strike (obviously), Market Gardener, Low hp with the escape plan Pyro: detonator jump and then you bhop or use the powerjack (duh) Demo: useless unless you’re an eyelander demo with 4 heads Heavy: revving while bhopping with the Tomislav, using the GRU, using the steak, or getting whipped by a soldier Engi: useless unless you’re trying to escape from someone or play movement trick on a spy (ig) Medic: pretty good especially if ur healing a scout. Hitting a few bhops before surfing is kinda useless but its cool idc lol Sniper: Engineer example applies here Spy: dead ringer feighn or big earner (or maybe a combo of both).

[@CongaYT]

The best dps upgrades in Mann vs Machine are the reload speed upgrades, mainly since the less time you're not shooting, means the more time you're doing DPS. Now, Imagine that in casual but instead of high reload speed you have an 8 clip rocket launcher

[@shauncypher9992]

The weakness of the airstrike is that your on ground and other solders has the disadvantage over you and scouts and others

[@RealLotto]

Yeah the air strike really stinks in close quarter maps like Dustbowls. I almost always switch to stock in those cases, or sometime I switch my brain off and use the Beggar.

[@ztein9058]

Hey Zeno, I was a huge fan back in the day when I was maybe 12. Now at 18 I am glad you’re making videos again. Nostalgia and I always thought you were funny even if I had to look up certain punchlines when younger. Anyway I wanted to ask what config and hud you use. Love the videos man!

[@zenoooooo]

Master comfig 8 and flawhud!

[@ztein9058]

@@zenoooooo Thanks!

[@QuintessentialWalrus]

Just chiming in to say I'm a fellow Air Strike enjoyer. I know it's not the most consistent rocket launcher, but it's a snowball weapon like the Eyelander. When you get 8 rockets, it becomes one of the best explosive weapons in the game... until you die lol. I love it!

[@NotaAura]

that was by far the most palatable raid: shadow legends ad i've ever seen. keep up the absolutely charming work

[@---hk7xl]

It's nice to see that the airstrike is finally getting some love from normal people, also jump lotus is a pretty good map to start out as it gives you a rough idea of what the airstrike is capable of

[@MrFreak0r]

I honestly thought the "Raid SHadow Legends" was a joke :D cringed so hard when I realized it was for real xD

[@BlaineGX]

I KNEW I recognized that sweet zenomite voice, glad ur back loved ur content and looks like it’s even better

[@genzo454]

Thank you for talking about my favorite rocket launcher. I'm not very good with it, but it's still a fav, even over the Liberty Launcher. Something about it's design and sounds just enraptures me.

[@blacklight683]

well the list is simple most effective:stock/original funny:rocket jumper cool:airstrake/baggers bazoka exsist:something something you know it but i forogt it

[@ThatWolfArrow]

I wouldn't say The Direct Hit just exists. But the Black Box, Cow Mangler, and Liberty Launcher definitely just exist.

[@blacklight683]

@@ThatWolfArrow i actually forgot about the direct hit💀

[@puzzlepuddles6712]

the airstrike is the beggars with more precision

[@UnTizio100K]

Finally a guide that doesn't sarcastically tell you not to use the air strike.

[@mattthekiller9129]

2:10 if i'm granted Rhonda comes out of the screen to headbutt me, i'll install Raid and tip Zeno all my money

[@oliverrose1643]

Hey Zeno, I am throwing the random comment out there. I just came back to tf2, and after looking at the state of tf2 youtube in the modern day you stay at the top. I love your modern videos, and especially your sense of humor that clearly hasn't changed. I am glad to see you still making tf2 content that makes you happy, and never feel pressured to stay, but I am glad you are here. I loved the 100 days of competitive, which was a fantastic take on (at this point) overused format, that you brought a lot of fun to. I know you are working on a "project bigger then [100 days of comp]" and I cant wait for your future videos beyond that. No matter what they are about.

[@GunKick]

its super cool with the manntreads, you can skybox yourself off any ramp or wall and stomp people for big damage for the kill or then you kill them with a final rocket

[@zenoooooo]

Oh my God we finally found a way to make the mantreads usable lmao

[@GunKick]

@@zenoooooo manntreads are super good what do you mean

[@surny_]

12:19 the recs being all NL, love to see it.

[@zenoooooo]

All about the eggman lmfao

[@shiny1556]

I have a fondness for the weaker launchers. There is just something fun about curbing somebody (especially a stock soldier) with something like the Liberty Launcher

[@questionablelifechoices7501]

I just recently started messing with the air strike and it's surprisingly fun. After remembering to not fully magdump i started pulling some pretty decent streaks. Now that I know about the bhop tech, its about to get real.

[@blacklight683]

10:00i see so now i have a reason to blame my monitor and not my skill

[@thegoose8663]

Recently I decided to 'experiment' with my map pool, and man, Banana Bay (which is now my favorite map in the entire game) Air Strike has been sooo much fun)

[@МатвейМасалов-ф1р]

"WHO'S THAT ROCKET LAUNCHER?" -IT'S THE AIRSTRIKE! "IT'S STOCK" -FUUUUU

[@Pudding404]

I feel airstrike is unintentionally more weird than beggars, beggars is weird because it's inconsistent, the potential of its rocket jumping with the self damage and monstrous damage output, but the airstrike is weird in a niche way when trying to use it without the base jumper, like the neon annihilator. It's most effective in places like along the signs of district, or jumping off the floors of mercenary Park, but what I like most about it is with gunboats that's the closest thing to the rocket jumper you'll get while still being able to use it offensively.

[@smacznykapec]

10:00 you just need to bind jumping on scroll and train. You don't need to have above 60 fps. As a person who could consistently perform bhop to store a market garden crit even when having between 40 and 50 fps i'm sure that's bullshit.

[@zenoooooo]

So it turns out there are two types of bhops- one that preserve momentum (frame perfect ones) and ones that preserve the rocket jumping status. The rocket jumping one has a variable frame (1-7) window depending on your server, but as I was practicing all of this on a local listen server they were one and the same to me. Another comment explained how it works to me and why It's much more consistent in real matches Although scroll wheel for jump just straight up never worked for me. Tf2 would drop mass jump inputs.

[@gravelpoot8402]

a soldier like van gogh's self-portrait is something...

[@thisbox]

This video reminded me of how cool Airstrike Gunboats is. Thank you.

[@SirWinnigton]

I love the air strike as someone that a novice with rocket jumps it still feels good to do a rudimentary bomb

[@craggs7205]

i plan on trying to use the airstrike in a competitive setting, ive seen it done with the beggars so i think it can sure as hell be done with the air strike

[@tomdolben]

you can tell right before he shouted out the sponsor he was reevaluating his life choices

[@petur9971]

the crazy air strike market gardens are one of my favorite things in tf2

[@snarcastic4452]

Holy shit, a video about one of my favorite rocket launchers... and a FFIV reference? Lol what, keep being infinitely cool :P

[@shivernaut8607]

I remember having the thought "huh rocket jumping is limited by the clip size of the launcher, so the airstrike theoretically should be able to do jumps no other rocket can." then I dismissed that thought because I am a pyro main. glad to know people give a shit about this weapon somewhere.

[@gabssbm]

glad to see you back after years :)

[@sonicmeerkat]

The airstrike was a launcher I only started properly using in dms of all things, killing my partner with a sudden bomb was always more effective than with direct hit cause well, it's still got a bit of splash at least especially after you land. But cheesy but my DMS are mostly wacky strategies like buffalo steak bear claws to punish jirate sniper since we're both 1 hit lol.

[@PixelyDino]

Hey sorry but could I get your hud settings? i really like how your crosshair does that and the hud in general. Thanks

[@QualityDoggo]

the ability to trolldier while still having rocket damage is also very fun and silly

[@lula4260]

Side note, a better thing to do is probably binding jump to scroll wheel if you're fine with using any other buttons for switching weapons, using scroll wheel in the source engine is weirdly consistent for bhops, The only game where it isn't to my knowledge is Left 4 Dead 2 And this isn't left 4 dead 2

[@zenoooooo]

I initially tried that- but everytime I did TF2 rejected the mass input of jump. It'd accept the first one but no others.

[@RedNK]

You ain't just cool, bro You're the COOLEST

[@stolisna]

i fucking love this gun. All of the cool jumps you can do with Airstrike is just so satisfying.

[@That_Paperbag]

what i like to do is bind mwheel up and mwheel down to jump so its way eisier to do a bhop

[@puunk_9240]

The info about framerates isn't awful but source engine games give you an insanely lenient window for bhops if your fps is capped and stable at exactly half the tickrate of the server. I don't recommend doing this, but I'm just sharing that as a window into the world of fps cap tricks in quake/goldsrc/source games. But yes generally high + stable framerate is good for precise AND spammed inputs.

[@Succer]

Where can I find info about this? So setting your fps cap at 33? How would you even do that?

[@puunk_9240]

@@Succer Just look up "fps cap bhop" and you'll find plenty of discussions and forum posts about it in different source engine games- fps_max is the command but because of input rounding issues like this different games have high minimum values so a game like csgo requires using an external program or graphics setting to go down to 32.

[@Succer]

@@puunk_9240 Okay cool thank you. It'd be funny to use this plus a macro to just jump around the map with airborne status lol

[@plasic74x16]

The funny thing about this video is that I saw it right after abusing the air strike to do some jump maps

[@Noah-ld4nw]

Just found your channel and watched pretty much all your new releases. Love the content hope to see new releases soon!

[@Arkanistt]

thank you for sending me stinky steve all those years ago

[@CoolSs]

The heavy nerf to the Base jumper is just annoying . I really hope they revert them . I don't care if 6s soldier can't airshot me . hitscan destroy any Base jumper soldier/demoman .

[@mikalicious.]

yoooo good video also sick patricia taxxon song at the end dude

[@thenoobman8824]

1:20 Epic transition And yes air strike underused

[@BBDudes]

DAMN BRO I JUST CONTRACTED RAIDS.

[@chancedrenning4159]

Finally, someone validated my collection of airstrikes. Also glad to see you again homie

[@Railgunner66]

The gun is very cool, super pogo's are dope, HOWEVER... the hidden blast radius penalty while rocket jumping plus the base penalty gives this the lowest blast radius besides the direct hit with a minus 28% while blast jumping. The clip at max takes an eternity to reload. and finally, it chews through ammo faster than any launcher. The main problem really is the hidden blast radius penalty while jumping though, that makes airstrikes unnecessarily hard given that most your rockets will already have falloff even if you are bombing with it.

[@Railgunner66]

also increased clipsize isnt that valuable on a rocketlauncher inately when rockets reload only slighty slower than they fire. 0.92 seconds for first reload vs 0.8 seconds for firing normally

[@patrlim]

basically the airstrike becomes a sticky bomb launcher but with rockets

[@klevinduck]

Alright you've convinced me this is so freaking damn cool

[@evangelos4346]

I personally use the panic attack or stock shotgun with it, but thats just cuz i like variety

[@CorruptdKetchup]

I think the coolest one for each class is: Mad Milk It turns the health pack-stealing son of a chat filter activator into a team player, with a team fight win button Air Strike Watch the video Dragon’s Fury If you pair it with the Detonator, you have the vertical and bursts of the horizontal mobility of a scout, can light groups of enemies on fire quickly, and shred ass in choke point team fights. Sandvich Spawned 3 other equally cool and unequally effective unlocks, and allows for more survivability on Heavy, the class that takes almost as much damage as Soldier. Scottish Resistance Discourages spamming, but allows for multiple traps or one infinite trap. Gunslinger Changes the engineer almost as much as the shields change Demoman. Vaccinator Although it sucks to play against, the concept is very cool and allows for more mechanical skill expression on Medic, a class that lacks it outside of the Crossbow. (Although surfing is more common on medic, all classes except Heavy gay decent use out of it, plus blast jumps are technically surfing) Jarate Like mad milk, but it’s cool down is too short Your Eternal Reward Cranks the “feel like a sneaky motherfucker” aspect of playing spy and cranks it up to 11.

[@CorruptdKetchup]

My personal favorite is the Dragon’s fury, as it is the best executed of the concepts in my opinion. It makes pyro’s mechanical skill floor and ceiling much higher, and allows Pyro to deal almost as much damage as Demoman in team fights.

[@donvitopatata]

I am quite the noob, and cant do any of the fancy rocketjumps/techs besides... well just jumping, but I love this weapon. Carpetbombing the shit out of anyone just feels so good.

[@timmythepinky9137]

Great video, except my laptop hates the inputs needed for rocket jumping so I ultimately can't do anything other than 1 jump

[@thrand6760]

Glad to be watching you again, no Polish national anthem intro though?... was always my favourite bit of a video haha

[@AdahnFlorence]

Hey man it's not that I dislike Niel Cicerega, I just prefer Oingo Boingo.

[@navelovesgnomes]

this video is cool ill spend at least 5 minutes trying it (sold soul to beggars bazooka 5 years ago) i like the part with lisa music

[@misplease]

this is why the game isn’t dead yet

[@seamistseamist]

Do you have a link to the HUD you're using?

[@RandomUsernameAppearsInChat]

the fact this video is sponsored by raid is funny enough for me to go though the Ad part xD

[@frog2098]

I was playing hightower once and saw a guy on my team doing triple sync jumps off walls with the air strike. I was inspired to try it out and I was absolutely terrible and I haven't touched the weapon since

[@zenoooooo]

That was my experience the first time I saw it too- it's a really cool gun that's really off-putting when you first use it

[@filepi]

Yo zeno, what are your config in your game ?, i really like how your game looks, could you tell me ?

[@FredChuck64]

Very interesting video, I might have to give the Air Strike a second try!

[@fakename5881]

old video, i know, but brother i need you to give the beggars a fair shake. its the mobility of the airstrike and so much more. i have a video on my channel cataloguing some beggars jumps if youre interested

[@zenoooooo]

The beggars is good! I use it sometimes. Honestly- the truth is that I default to Direct hit- I think my direct hit has like 12k kills lol

[@hamzaahmed652]

Personally I love using the airstrike with banners especially with buff banner since you have 8 rockets to assert aerial supremacy

[@UnusuallyLargeCrab]

This was so much more fun when the base jumper could still be toggled.

[@ronanclark2129]

I like your raid adds because evidently it does something good for you when I skip it

[@kgypt2951]

Alright, time to rebuy my strange airstrike.

[@BrineyBat]

been loving my dive rocket launcher lately

[@jonathancooper6648]

i love the airstrike im committed to learning these jumps

[@risingrevolt]

Mouse2 being set to jump is new way I've heard to bhop interesting 🤔

[@CWOFFEE]

air strike is cool IMO but i really cannot recommend beggar's enough, both from a practical and coolness perspective. no snowball mechanic, no dmg penalty, the mobility you mentioned, etc. in most cases in pubs, i would probably say that the only thing air strike meaningfully has over beggar's is the ability to directly snipe sentries. i say this both as someone who started out with air strike before moving onto the beggar's, and as someone who went through the same "seeing maps in a different light" but to a greater extent with beggar's than with air strike. tl;dr air strike is cool and isnt totally outclassed, but i *usually* find that most people who like it like beggars even more - i recommend putting a fair bit of time into it if you havent already

[@artezac]

I'd also recommend binding jump to scroll wheel,, makes it a lot easier personally

[@zenoooooo]

I had an issue where scrollwheel would drop the majority of my inputs and cause me to whiff jumps regularly. Is there something you did to make it more consistent?

[@artezac]

@@zenoooooo only advice for that is make sure to only use it directly as you hit the ground

[@zenoooooo]

Okay so I'll just keep manually clicking then lmao Atleast then I know it's my own fault if it whiffs and not TF2 pitching a fit that I gave it a bunch of jump inputs

[@dreaming_fox163]

most know its potential spam so its banned in highlander. even though its allowed in 6s, base jumper is banned making it useless against good team.

[@ruzgar1372]

6:55 Tide Turner?

[@sannanananaaa]

I really loved the small bit at the end of the ad. All of us have been posessed by the demon of capitalism at some point, unfortunately.

[@aTF2player]

The fact that that ad read wasnt a bit actually threw me off

[@retakermain8334]

airstrike is a worse (or better) version of the beggars bazooka

[@TrouserSnivy]

"the rocket jumper can't do this" no but the beggar's bazooka can, as well as basically everything else shown here, and more, and over a longer, sustained period of time overall. Main differnces are that air strike is just easier and safer and doesn't demand a skillset that is unique to itself, just easier stock. And that you can store up to eight shots. I found it kind of funny that you said the air strike is the "only" weapon that will make you look at maps differently, then proceeded to do some of the exact jumps I and a lot of other people have been doing with the bazooka for like eight years

[@zenoooooo]

Some of us like when our shots actually go where we aim them

[@KozelPraiseGOELRO]

11:03 do you think 250 is good enough? or I need the exact 372

[@zenoooooo]

Uhhhh