Stickybomb Launcher

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Ye appear to 'ave trodden on a mine!
The Demoman

The Stickybomb Launcher is the default secondary weapon for the Demoman. It is a modified grenade launcher with a large drum magazine, an under-barrel foregrip, and a wide barrel. A charging handle used for reloading sits on the back left side, above the trigger.

This weapon launches small, glowing, spiked bombs that adhere to almost any surface, but bounce off enemy players, buildings, and certain map entities such as spawn gates or Payload carts. Stickybombs do not explode on contact, but instead can be detonated manually with secondary fire approximately 0.7 seconds after being deployed when the bombs signal the end of their arm time by blinking twice. The bombs disappear harmlessly with a white flash and a burst of debris should the Demoman who placed them die or if they are hit by bullets, syringes (with the exception of the Crusader's Crossbow), melee attacks, or explosions caused by the Scorch Shot, Detonator, Scottish Resistance, and Quickiebomb Launcher. Up to eight Stickybombs can be placed at one time; attempting to deploy a ninth bomb will result in the oldest bomb detonating as soon as the youngest finishes its arm time. The total number of bombs in place on the map is shown on the HUD. Demomen cannot detonate sticky bombs while taunting.

Should a Stickybomb be hit with a compression blast, or an explosion from any enemy weapon except the Scottish Resistance and the Quickiebomb Launcher, it is detached from the surface it was on and pushed away, but does not detonate. Stickybombs pushed in this way no longer stick to surfaces, but do still experience a lot of friction, meaning they roll to a rest more rapidly than Grenades. The Stickybombs are otherwise unharmed by the force of the blast and can be detonated as normal. Stickybomb explosions deal splash damage: there is a blast radius falloff that causes less damage to be done the greater the distance a target is from the center of an explosion, even for critical hits, with a minimum of 50% damage being done at the very edge of the blast radius. Stickybomb explosions can be used to juggle targets or throw them into environmental hazards.

The Demoman can also use Stickybombs to propel himself into the air. Compared the Soldier, the Demoman has a lower self-damage resistance to his own explosives, so the damage dealt to the Demoman is much higher, sometimes as much as half of the Demoman's total health. However, stickybombs also send the Demoman significantly further than a single rocket can send the Soldier and the manual detonation can offer the Demoman a much finer degree of control over his blast jumps.

Stickybombs are fired from the launcher at 805 Hammer units per second, which is around 55 km/h. By holding down primary fire, the launcher can be charged up to launch a stickybomb over greater distances. A meter below the ammo count shows how much force is behind the stickybomb, and the launcher begins to tremble when it is reaching its maximum strength. If the charge bar fills completely, the sticky is fired automatically. A fully charged stickybomb travels at a speed equivalent to approximately 230% of that of an uncharged one. The Stickybomb Launcher has a slight spread, and so stickybombs are not 100% accurate in where they land.

Like most weapons, the distance from the player to the target changes the damage stickybombs do. However, this is only true of stickybombs that are younger than 5 seconds. After that, they use their base damage to calculate damage (explosive damage falloff still applies).

Damage and function times

See also: Damage
Damage and function times
Shot type Projectile
Damage type Explosive
Ranged or Melee damage? Ranged
Damage
Maximum ramp-up 120% 144
Base damage 100% 120
Maximum fall-off 52.8% 64
Critical 180 cm: 180
90 cm: 261
Under: 355
Mini-crit 180 cm: 81
90 cm: 117
Under: 165
Splash damage
Minimum splash 50% 270 cm
Damage reduction 1% / 2.92
Splash damage range 180 cm: 47-90
90 cm: 60-124
Under: 103-138
Self-damage 45-114
Function times
Attack interval 0.6 s
Reload (first) 1.09 s
Reload (consecutive) 0.67 s
Activation time 0.7 s
Maximum charge time 4.00 s
Values are approximate and determined by community testing.

Demonstration

Strange variant


Related achievements

Leaderboard class soldier.png Soldier

Bomb Squaddie
Bomb Squaddie
Destroy 10 sticky bombs with the shotgun in a single life.

Leaderboard class demoman.png Demoman

Double Mauled Scotch
Double Mauled Scotch
Kill 2 people in a single sticky jump.


He Who Celt It
He Who Celt It
Use the Sticky Launcher to kill an enemy player via environmental damage.


Highland Fling
Highland Fling
Sticky jump a really long way...


Loch Ness Bombster
Loch Ness Bombster
Kill an enemy player with stickybombs within 5 seconds of them teleporting.


Pipebagger
Pipebagger
Kill at least three players with a single detonation of stickybombs.


Robbed Royal
Robbed Royal
Destroy 100 enemy stickybombs with the Scottish Resistance.
Scotch Guard
Scotch Guard
Kill 3 enemies capping or pushing a cart in a single stickybomb detonation 3 separate times.


Something Stickied This Way Comes
Something Stickied This Way Comes
Kill 30 players with air burst stickybombs.


The Argyle Sap
The Argyle Sap
Blow up an Engineer, his sentry gun, and his dispenser with a single stickybomb detonation.


The High Road
The High Road
Sticky jump onto a cap point and capture it.


The Scottish Play
The Scottish Play
Get a melee kill while sticky jumping.


The Stickening
The Stickening
Kill 3 Heavies from full health with a single stickybomb detonation.

Leaderboard class heavy.png Heavy

0wn the Means of Production
0wn the Means of Production
Remove 20 stickybombs by killing the Demomen who produced them.

Leaderboard class engineer.png Engineer

How the Pests Was Gunned
How the Pests Was Gunned
Destroy 50 enemy stickybombs lying in range of friendly buildings.

Leaderboard class sniper.png Sniper

Eagle Eye
Eagle Eye
While using The Classic, kill a rocket/grenade jumping enemy in midair with a full charge, no-scope headshot.
Jumper Stumper
Jumper Stumper
Kill a rocket or grenade-jumping enemy in midair with your Sniper Rifle or the Huntsman.

Template:Dictionary/items/styles

Main article: Styles
Styles
Festive Stickybomb Launcher Style1.png
Festive Stickybomb Launcher Style2.png
Festive Festivest

Note: Only applies to the Festive variant of this weapon.

Update history

September 27, 2007 Patch
  • Fixed prediction error that caused jittery Stickybomb Launcher behavior.

February 28, 2008 Patch

  • Reduced Demoman's maximum Stickybomb reserve ammo from 40 to 24.

March 6, 2008 Patch

  • Fixed critical modifier for explosive weapons (rockets, pipe bombs) increasing critical chance more than intended.

February 16, 2009 Patch

  • Stickybombs now get a reduced close range damage ramp up (like Rocket Launcher & Syringe Gun).
    • Ultimately reduces damage done by Stickybombs to enemies < 512 Hammer units from the Demoman.
  • Demoman's secondary weapon has been renamed to Stickybomb Launcher.

May 5, 2010 Patch

  • Fixed deflected Stickybombs becoming mini-crits when detonated.
  • Fixed deflected Stickybombs becoming crits if the Pyro was crit-boosted.

January 19, 2011 Patch

  • [Undocumented] The Stickybomb Launcher now drops the appropriate weapon on death, on RED team.

February 14, 2011 Patch

  • Fixed the Stickybomb Launcher viewmodel sleeves using the wrong team colors for team BLU.
  • Fixed melee attacks not destroying remote detonation pipes (Stickybombs).

April 20, 2011 Patch

  • Fixed the Stickybomb Launcher and the Sticky Jumper using the wrong skins.

June 23, 2011 Patch (Über Update)

  • [Undocumented] Added Strange quality.

July 18, 2011 Patch

  • Fixed a case where stickybombs could sometimes damage enemies on the other side of a wall.

July 22, 2011 Patch

  • Updated the gamehaptics file.
    • Refined the Demoman's Stickybomb Launcher reload forces.

December 15, 2011 Patch (Australian Christmas 2011)

December 19, 2011 Patch

  • Festive Stickybomb Launchers can now be gifted.

April 27, 2012 Patch

  • [Undocumented] Stickybombs and grenades now have a team-colored aura when fired and a rapidly flashing critical particle effect.

May 3, 2012 Patch

  • Fixed a rendering error affecting sticky bomb particle effects.

August 15, 2012 Patch (Mann vs. Machine Update)

  • [Undocumented] Added Silver and Gold Botkiller variants.

October 9, 2012 Patch

  • Added Rust, Blood, Carbonado, and Diamond Botkiller variants.

December 20, 2012 Patch (Mecha Update)

  • Added Silver and Gold Botkiller Mk. II variants.

February 14, 2013 Patch

  • Added multicolored-lights style to the Festive Stickybomb Launcher.
  • Fixed the Stickybomb Launcher using the wrong RED team arms skin while on the BLU team.

February 15, 2013 Patch

  • Fixed the BLU team Stickybomb Launcher using the Scottish Resistance material when dropped into the world.

November 21, 2013 Patch (Two Cities Update)

June 18, 2014 Patch (Love & War Update)

  • All Demoman stickybombs now have damage ramp up. Full damage is reached 2 seconds after firing.

June 23, 2014 Patch

  • Reverted the recent stickybomb damage ramp up change. We will continue to evaluate the use of stickybomb air detonations and potential changes to that mechanic.

September 10, 2014 Patch

  • [Undocumented] Demoman can no longer detonate sticky bombs while taunting.

September 15, 2014 Patch

  • Demoman can no longer detonate sticky bombs while taunting.

December 22, 2014 Patch (Smissmas 2014)

  • Stickybombs that detonate in the air now have a radius ramp up, starting at 85% at base arm time (0.8s) going back to 100% over 2 seconds. Stickybombs that touch the world will have full radius.
  • Stickybombs now have a more visible trail while traveling through the air.
  • Stickybombs arm particle is slightly more visible.
  • Damage variance on stickybombs reduced from +/- 10% damage to +/-2%.
  • Stickybombs now have the same base blast radius as rockets. Changed from 159Hu to 146Hu.

January 7, 2015 Patch

  • Fixed the air detonation radius for stickybomb jumps.
  • Fixed stickybombs not using distance falloff during damage calculations for the first 5 seconds after being created.

July 2, 2015 Patch #1 (Gun Mettle Update)

  • [Undocumented] Updated model to c_model system.

August 27, 2015 Patch

  • Updated the materials for the Stickybomb Launcher.

December 17, 2015 Patch (Tough Break Update)

  • Updated description to better detail the weapon's functionality.

February 29, 2016 Patch

  • [Undocumented] Updated all Stickybomb Launcher's reload sounds.

December 13, 2017 Patch

  • Fixed not being able to detonate stickybombs when switching to melee with secondary attack held down.
  • Fixed the charge sound for the Stickybomb Launcher not stopping if the player switches weapons while charging.

March 28, 2018 Patch #1

  • Fixed stickybombs sometimes blocking explosive damage from other stickybombs.

July 25, 2019 Patch (Summer 2019 Pack)

  • Fixed and(sic) exploit where stickybombs could not be destroyed or pushed by the enemy team.

Bugs

  • The Scottish Resistance-specific achievement Sticky Thump can sometimes be earned with this weapon.
  • When changing the styles on the festive variant, the preview does not show the light bulbs.
  • Stickybombs detonated manually do not leave explosion decals, but stickybombs detonated automatically do.
  • Dying while charging a stickybomb does not stop the charge sound from playing.

Unused content

Unused Pipebomb model.
  • Based on its name displayed on the stats page, the Stickybomb Launcher was originally supposed to be the Pipebomb Launcher, a weapon from the first Team Fortress. It is thought to have been similar to the Grenade Launcher except that the grenades would only detonate when the player pressed the alt fire key (as seen in Trailer 2). The Pipebomb Launcher's grenade is still in the game files.

Trivia

  • In real life, a "sticky bomb" refers to an adhesive-coated "squash head" explosive developed as an anti-tank grenade for the British Armed Forces in WW2 following the loss of much of their anti-tank guns during the Fall of France. Unlike TF2's stickybomb launcher, these would need to have their metal shell removed to expose the adhesive before being thrown and affixed by hand to an armored target and would detonate on a conventional fuse.
  • The description of the Black Watch instead mentions stickybombs as being accidentally invented by the "desperately sober" Fifth Battalion of the eponymous Black Watch, though the exact date is left ambiguous.
  • The Stickybomb Launcher bears resemblance to a weapon cut from Half-Life 2, simply named the "Sticky Launcher". Had it been included, it would have functioned in an almost identical manner, except that it would stick to enemies as well as map surfaces.

Gallery

Merchandise

See also