⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀"I have yet to meet one who can outsmart bullet."

I'm not one to mince words, so here we go; Heavy is the most powerful class in MVM, especially Two Cities, and a good Heavy can be the difference between winning and losing a wave.

Heavy has a lot of roles to fill, which ironically makes the slowest class in the game one of the most versatile. A good Heavy can serve as a Giant blocker, healer, crowd controller, and even help completely shut down some enemies like those stupid Giant rapid-fire Soldiers in Mannhattan. Alongside Medic, Scout, and Engineer, Heavy is one of the most important classes in MVM and a crucial part of team composition.

There's a reason why the go-to meta for Expert tours is a Scout, an Engineer, a Demoman, and three Heavies. Heavy is good at every role given to him (excluding Tank fights, but we'll get to that) and can arguably solo some of the Boot Camp maps with the right upgades. He's a force to be reckoned with and should never be discounted.

Specifically, though, Heavy has two techniques that he excels at more than any other class; pure damage and shutting down giants. While Pyro can melt tanks, Demo can shutdown Übers, Soldier can deal with crowds of enemies, and Scout can rake in the rewards of late-stage capitalism, Heavy can dish out the most damage on a single target of any class excluding tanks. Heavy's primary roles should be thus:

• Shutting down Giants
  
  • Heavy's bread and butter. With his ability to dish out insane amounts of damage in just a few seconds, Heavy is the team's best way to deal with threatening giants --- especially those that would kill lighter classes such as Demoman.

• Shutting down tightly packed crowds
  
  • More powerful in the latter waves, Heavy's upgrades lend themselves to focusing more on Heavy's insane damage potential to help destroy tightly packed waves of fragile enemies, such as Scouts, Pyros, and with resistances Pyros, Demos, and even Soldiers.

⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ "I am Heavy Weapons Guy... and this is my weapon."

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Comrade, meet Oksana and Sasha --- the Brass Beast and stock Minigun. They're your new best friends. The Minigun is a classic, one of the oldest weapons in TF2 that costs $12,000 to be fired for 12 seconds.

The Brass Beast is based on a classic Gatling gun, although it lacks the hand crank and in real life Gatling guns were made out of steel --- they used brass cartridges. Known as "Oksana" by the Heavy, it has to wrestle with Sasha for contention in the MVM Meta.


The Minigun and Brass Beast are used over other guns for two weapons; damage per second, or DPS. Sasha and Oksana can deal more damage than the other miniguns in Heavy's roster, given that the Tomislav and Natascha have damage penalties and the Huo-Long Heater eats ammo like the Tsar ate cabbage soup alongside its damage penalty.


The choice between Sasha and Oksana may be a bit confusing at first, but the choice isn't too hard. The stock Minigun usually proves more useful in the earlier waves, where mobility may be a bit more of an issue because of the team having less upgrades, especially in movement speed and other ways to get around the map. In later waves, the Brass Beast is usually the better choice due to the prevalence of giants and more movement speed on other damage dealing classes to deal with stragglers.

In short --- it's better to use Minigun in the early waves, but once you can invest in crit canteens alongside fire speed and ammo capacity, it's a wise idea to switch off to the Brass Beast.

Minigun:


Brass Beast:

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The Sandvich should really be the only secondary you use. Unlike in general TF2, your secondary's primary role isn't a tool to heal yourself; this is a gamemode where you'll have a Medic by your side and you'll be near dispensers, and they can heal your bullet holes much better than ham-on-rye.

The main use for your Sandvich in MVM is to heal your teammates, especially your Medic. Keep a close eye on your Medic's health when he's healing you; if he drops to around 80, throw him your sandwich to top off his health. Your Sandvich will heal each class for half of their maximum health, which means Medic will be healed to max health between 149 and 74.


Good questions. The Dalokohs Bar can be singled out for the aforementioned reasons: you're surrounded by healing, so it's not a necessity to heal yourself even more. The Second Banana also isn't as useful because it only heals for 25% --- that's only 38 health on a Medic, rounded up. The Sandvich just gives you more reward for your ruble to help heal your team.

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Heavy has three real choices for his melee --- the Gloves of Running Urgently, the Killing Gloves of Boxing, and the Fists of Steel.


Honestly, these are Heavy's only viable melees in both MVM and otherwise (I guess the Holiday Punch can also be used in niche circumstances outside of MVM, but I digress). The Gloves of Running Urgently speed up Heavy to the Engineer and Sniper, while the Killing Gloves of Boxing give Heavy guaranteed critical hits for a few seconds, and the Fists of Steel reduce incoming damage while deployed.

Heavy's stock fists are just your average stock melee which do no good on a class that's already the most powerful in close combat, the Eviction Notice is just the GRU but worse, and the Holiday Punch is useless on robots since they can't laugh.


It depends. The Gloves of Running Urgently are always a safe bet, while the Fists of Steel can keep your survivability up and are best used without a Medic. The Killing Gloves of Boxing are only really usable with Fire Speed upgrades, but can help in a pinch if you're out of crit canteens.

Gloves of Running Urgently:


Killing Gloves of Boxing:


Fists of Steel:

⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀     "Yes. I like this new weapon."

Heavy's upgrades are fairly straightforward. Unlike other classes he cannot outright upgrade his damage; instead, Heavy's main way of dealing more damage is through upgrading his firing speed and projectile penetration. With each level of firing speed your weapon (ideally) shoots faster, and with each level of projectile penetration, your bullets penetrate one more robot.

There's just two problems.

One: ammo capacity. The faster you fire your gun, the more ammo you burn through.

Two: the firing speed upgrade's kinda messed up.

By default, miniguns fire 4 bullets every 7 ticks. Theoretically, this should increase by 10% every upgrade, but there's a problem. Level 2 on firing speed makes the Minigun fire every 5.6 ticks; and here's the rub. Partial ticks cannot exist, so for every tick it rounds to the nearest number. Level 1 works as intended, firing each round every 6 ticks. However, level 2 doesn't work as intended. Theoretically, it should boost firing speed by 20% --- but it doesn't. Since partial ticks can't exist, the firing speed upgrade is rounded up... to 6, meaning that the firing speed doesn't change at all between upgrade 1 and upgrade 2.

Yeah, firing speed's second upgrade doesn't work.

For this reason, I recommend buying other upgrades before upgrading firing speed past level 1. The only time I upgrade firing speed past level 1 is when I have enough money to upgrade it to level 3 or 4 in a single trip, since 3 and 4 work as intended --- level 3 rounds to 5 ticks and level 4 rounds to 4 ticks.



By the last wave, your upgrades should look something like this:



FIRING SPEED:

This one should be self-explanatory. Faster bullets = good.

AMMO CAPACITY:

Ammo capacity should be a priority if you don't have a dispenser or your Engineer doesn't have the dispenser range upgrades. Otherwise, 'tis pretty safe to save these upgrades for later on when you have the credits for it.

HEALTH ON KILL:

Combined with dispensers, Projectile Penetration, and crits, you've basically become an unstoppable Soviet steamroller powered by the blood and burnt money of robots. If you have to choose between ammo capacity and this and you have a good Engineer with an active dispenser, get this.

PROJECTILE PENETRATION:

Again, pretty self-explanatory. This is Heavy's best way to deal with crowds and really his only way to deal with non-Über Medics if the Demoman or Sniper doesn't get them.

WAVE RESISTANCES:

Look up. Buy resistances that'll help most in your current wave, and don't be afraid to refund upgrades for better resistances. Glowing blue borders mean crits, and those waves should be the only time you invest in crit resistance. Otherwise, pretty self-explanatory.

SANDVICH RECHARGE:

Extra recharge speed on your Sandvich isn't a priority but it's probably the best thing to spend excess credits in outside of resistances and canteens. More Sandviches means faster health, although most of the time your money can be better spelt elsewhere.


KNOCKBACK RAGE:

Knockback is actually a bad thing in MVM unless you're completely out of options. By knocking back robots you're actually nerfing yourself by cancelling out your damage ramp-up; the closer you are to robots, the more damage you do. You'll also mess up your teammates, so it's best to steer clear of this one.

DESTROY PROJECTILES:

Destroy Projectiles isn't too bad but it's pretty outclassed by Medic's shield in every way. It's a good way to spend excess money if you have any, seeing as the shield won't be constant and you usually focus on powerful projectile robots anyways, but your money's better spent elsewhere for the most part.

MELEE UPGRADES:

You'll not really use your melee that much unless you're running the KGB, but even then your money's better spent elsewhere.


KRITZ:

Critical hits should be your go-to canteen most of the time. The more critical hits you can dish out the better, especially if your Medic's running something besides the Kritzkrieg like the Quick-Fix or Vaccinator. You can melt giants with crits and completely destroy crowds, topping off your health.

ÜBERCHARGE:

Übercharge should be the only other canteen you go for. It's helpful in a pinch and can synthesize pretty well with the Kritzkrieg, but for the most part your survivability should be good without them.

AMMO REFILL:

Ammo refill is good to mention because it also completely recharges your Sandvich cooldown. It's not the best canteen by far, but it's helpful in a pinch.

⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀    If you were from where I was from, you'd be ♥♥♥♥♥♥' dead!

Scout and Heavy won't interact much, probably to Heavy's delight. Scout's main role is to get in the face of bots and debuff them while collecting money.

Heavy and Scout work together pretty well, but most of the time they'll not be actively helping each other out. Scout will often milk and fan robots while sometimes drawing aggro and jumping around them with the Soda Popper, leaving Heavy to deal damage without taking any. With the Mad Milk, Scout is probably Heavy's best way of consistently regenerating health and alongside a Medic and Health on Kill can make the Heavy functionally invincible.

The only real downside to Heavy and Scout's relationship in MVM is that Scout sometimes eats Heavy's bullets, but most of the time this won't be a major issue. Overall, Scout and Heavy play to each other's strengths incredibly well and may be one of the best synergies in the metagame.

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⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀   Stars and Stripes beats Hammer and Sickle, look it up!

Soldier is the one game's main crowd controllers alongside Sniper, Demo, and Pyro, and works alongside Heavy to clean up crowds of bots that can overrun the team if not handled properly. Like in the main game, Soldier is a generalist class that works pretty well with every class on the roster.

Soldier's main benefit to Heavy is the different banners he can equip. The most useful for Heavy and most used in MVM is the Buff Banner, which gives a 10 second minicrit buff to the team. In Mannhattan, Soldier's job is usually to help Demoman and Engineer cover the stairs while outside of Mannhattan Soldier can help the team destroy tanks --- he's the team's main tank buster if the team doesn't have a Pyro.

Soldier and Heavy cover each other's weaknesses surprisingly well. Heavy can help deal with Pyros that will cripple Soldier's offensive capabilities and Soldier will help the team deal with tanks and crowds of enemies Heavy can have trouble with dealing on his own.

RIP Rick May. Godspeed, you magnificent bastard.

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⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ Do you believe in magic?

Pyro is one of three contenders for the most powerful class in MVM alongside Heavy and Engineer. They're arguably the game's best crowd controller bar none, and also a fantastic tank shredder only rivaled in that department by Engineer and Soldier.

Pyro doesn't work great with Heavy. Together, they cast a net over crowd control. While an overlapping job works with Soldier's extra mobility, since Pyro has little mobility outside of the Thermal Thruster (which isn't great, especially when the Gas Passer and Detonator are available) they tend to work against each other. What Pyro does have that Heavy doesn't, though, is the ability to shred through tanks. Pyro is the game's best tank killer, cutting through tanks like a thirsty Russian through a vodka bottle.

Pyro covers Heavy's weakness towards tanks greatly, but outside of that the two don't synergize very well.

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⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ You appear to have trodden on a mine!

Demoman's primary role in MVM is to take out Über Medics and large crowds. He and Heavy work great to take out Giants, as Demoman taking out Medic support means Heavy can kill Giants faster. Demoman also has great mobility and can clear out crowds that get by Heavy.

Demoman's main benefit to Heavy is, as mentioned above, the ability to take out Über Medics. Über Medics always pop when they go under 75 health, so Demo's ability to take them out in a single hit is a great boon to the Heavy. Demoman can also deal serious damage to tanks, covering Heavy's aforementioned pool noodle damage towards them.

Demo and Heavy compliment each other pretty well, but overall Heavy has better partners in Scout, Engineer, and Medic.

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⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀    Robots! I will BREAK YOU!

We're an army of the country, we're an army of the people, blah, blah, blah. A squad of three Heavies is the go-to meta in Advanced tours alongside an Engineer, Sniper, and a Scout, and for good reason. A squadron of Heavies can melt Giants in seconds and completely mow down crowds of enemies with the proper upgrades.

Other Heavies can benefit yourself in the same way you can benefit the rest of your team --- damage to Giants and dishing out healing. Two sandwiches is enough to fully heal any class, and maxxed out Brass Beasts can melt even the biggest non-Boss Giants in under three seconds.

More Heavies are usually a good thing, but be wary. Too many and you won't be able to deal with tanks nor have adequate ways to replenish health and ammo, but too few and you won't be able to deal with giants as effectively.

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⠀⠀⠀     Don't worry, boys! The Engineer is Engi-here! [laughs] Yeah...still tinkerin' with that one.

The Engineer is your best friend alongside the Medic. A good Engineer can be the difference between life and death, with maxed out dispenser range being able to top off your health and give you, with no exaggeration, unlimited ammo.

Engineer's sentry can help deal with tanks that you can't buckle down, and you can block Sentry Busters and keep that sentry up for as long as possible without the Engineer having to worry about carrying it to the buster to blow it up. A good teleporter also saves you trips around the map, which saves your health if you're running the GRU.

A good dispenser is arguably the most effective tool in MVM, but be wary --- don't stick right on top of it, or you'll help blow it up! You draw the most aggro, after all. Treat your Engineer and his buildings right, and you'll be just fine.

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⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀Oh, don't be such a baby. Ribs grow back! (No zhey don't.)

Forget the DDR; this is the best Soviet-German relationship of all time. Medic is your best friend, and German engineering combined with Soviet steel makes an unstoppable killing force that can dominate the team leaderboard.

All of Medic's Übercharges work to your advantage, but the one you'll see the most often (and get the most benefit out of) is the Kritzkrieg. 8 or more seconds of guaranteed critical hits combined with maxed out firing speed and an ungodly amount of health makes Heavy the team's single largest damage dealer in the game, and combine Heavy's large hitbox with 750 max overheal and you have a prime way to completely shut down Giants that get too close.

Keep feeding your Medic Sandviches and you'll become unseperable. Just be sure to keep an eye on how close you are to the frontline; the Medic is pretty squishy, and you don't want to murder your best friend... do you?

⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀Boom. Headshot.

Sniper is Demoman but better against groups and worse against tanks, honestly. Sniper is arguably the best crowd controller in the entire game given that his crowd control has no cooldown unlike Pyro's Gas Passer and Demo's stickies.

Sniper and Heavy won't interact too much, although you'll notice a good Sniper. Sniper deals serious damage to Giants and can eradicate entire groups of crowds --- a good Sniper can leave Giants completely open to your barrage and deal with the bomb better than any other class besides maybe Scout and Soldier.

Overall, Sniper is a welcome addition to Heavy's team. You may not hear the shots from his suppressed rifle, but you'll certainly notice the damage he brings to the metal men you're fighting off.

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⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀Did you forget about me?

I'll make this simple --- everything Spy can do, Heavy does better. Heavy does everything better than Spy. The only thing Spy can outclass Heavy in is damage done to other Giants when Heavy's mowing down a single Giant like the Medic/Heavy combo in Coal Town, but that's it.

Spy is also decent at dealing with Engibots, but most of the time they can be taken out by an ubered Heavy or Demoman without too much fuss. Unfortunately for our vanishing Frenchman he's just outclassed in nearly every aspect by other classes.

Spy is the weakest addition to a team but in the right hands can be pretty effective. Overall though he's still very weak and outclassed by Heavy and Sniper in his niches of Giant-killing and crowd control.

⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀     "Not one step back!"
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀       - J. V. Stalin, 1942

As the Heavy Weapons Guy, your main goal should always be focusing on giants. If a giant drops down onto the battlefield it should be your utmost priority; put aside tanks, crowds, and Sentry Busters!

As a general rule, you should always stick close enough to the frontlines of the wave but not close enough to be suicidal. Another good rule of thumb is to stick close to dispensers, but not directly on top of them; you'll draw more aggro than any other class (besides Spy and maybe Scout), and you don't want splash damage destroying a main lifeline of the team.

For example, on Coaltown:


All three areas listed are pretty close to the frontline without being too suicidal. They're close to the usual dispenser spots of behind the chickenwire and in the bush without being too on top of them, and you're close enough to the frontline to deal damage rampup without having a plan to retreat if things get hairy.

In Mannhattan, arguably the most popular MVM map, the areas where you should usually stick to are pretty similar:


This obviously changes depending on dispenser placement and if you're chasing down Giants, but most of the time you should be very close to the ramp and entrance. You should hardly ever go upstairs, although if a Giant Scout or other giant is coming down that way and nothing's coming from the usual entrance then by all means feel free to fill your niche.

After giants, you should focus on Sentry Busters, then crowds, then stragglers, and then tanks. All of Heavy's primary weapons have a whopping 70% damage decrease against tanks which is only confounded by the 50% damage nerf when revving up.

Your list of priority targets should look something like this:

⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀     We make good team!

Comrade! You have now made the necessary steps towards progressing as the world's most powerful Soviet strongman.

Heavy's the damage-dealing lynchpin of the team, and you should fulfill that role to the fullest. When you're not mowing down Giants you should be focusing anything that can threaten your team, be it the bomb carrier, Engibots, or crowds that your Pyro, Sniper, Demo, and/or Soldier can't deal with right now.

In the right hands you can become an unstoppable force of metal killing might. Go on and make the motherland proud, comrade!