My thoughts about Trickstabs

Vladdleco

Forum Extremist
Jul 2, 2018
282
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France (Baguette Land)
Hello everyone !

I dont if this will be interesting but I wanted to know your thoughts about Trickstabs and I will share also my opinion about them as a spy "main" that can half trickstab people.
I think trickstabs are based on skills and also because Valve can't fix their game.

About the skill part of trickstab :

You have to know the basics about how to stab and the stab hitboxe to manage to pull off trickstabs. F2P cant trickstabs and they need to know the basics : The matador, StairStab, Circle Strafing etc...
You need also good movement predicton to manage to trickstab people.
And then you will be able to get far more difficult stabs like surf stab and do incredible spy frags montage.
So not everyone can trickstab. Even with NEARLY 300 hours on spy, I dont trickstab often people and I often die (Maybe cuz Im bad).

About TF2 mechanics :
You know that moment when you are getting facestab but, on your screen, he was in front of you ?
This is the part of trickstabs which is relying on bad hitboxes and bad lag compensation of the game. Facestabs and trickstabs in general are working because the back hitboxe is at 180° and not totally behind you. Thats why matador are working. Spies rely on the fact that if you turn your head 2mm away from them to get reickstabs.
Even if you are a god at tracking people, you can get trickstab due to the server not registering fast enough your movements.

Theses are my opinions about trickstabs.
I would like to know your thoughts about trickstabs too.
And especially, I would like to hear your answers if you think what I have said is wrong.
 

rainman

Well-Known Member
Nov 27, 2018
79
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63
Solely using trickstabs to get kills is rather pointless in my opinion as players tend to catch up on you and they are very easy to counter.
It is useful to know them in the few situations where there is no way out such as a pyro chasing you around a corner and such. And not using them too often so people don't see them coming is a good idea. Also if you play spy in casual I hope you step on a pinecone, because I want to kill f2p's as a heavy in peace.
 

Hypernova

the one with many names
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Jun 25, 2019
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ive had a facestab once, but i wasn't the sphee, i killed sphee, he stabed my face (it was a backstab) we were both confused about it
Post automatically merged:

ive had a facestab once, but i wasn't the sphee, i killed sphee, he stabed my face (it was a backstab) we were both confused about it
(to put this better, i shot a rocket and he stabed my face but it was a backstab somehow and confusion occured, yes, we both died, this was on 2fort, casual.)
 

Neliel

Laureline
★ Donor ★
Nov 26, 2018
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I see trickstabs as a meme just like trolldier. Very inconsistent and unreliable way to beat your oponent. Also, as soon as you try matching with more experienced players, they just don't work, at all... There are probably 4 spyes in the world that can reliably do a metador on me. For fun I usaly stand still and let the spy mains butter me to death as heavy, so they get angry for not getting backstabs. I think people don't understand how spy works. His primary weapon is a revolver and not a knife, and the only time he should use it is with unaware enemys.
 

Hypernova

the one with many names
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Jun 25, 2019
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I see trickstabs as a meme just like trolldier. Very inconsistent and unreliable way to beat your oponent. Also, as soon as you try matching with more experienced players, they just don't work, at all... There are probably 4 spyes in the world that can reliably do a metador on me. For fun I usaly stand still and let the spy mains butter me to death as heavy, so they get angry for not getting backstabs. I think people don't understand how spy works. His primary weapon is a revolver and not a knife, and the only time he should use it is with unaware enemys.
i agree with everything
 

Hypernova

the one with many names
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Jun 25, 2019
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lmao
the bad spy enters the chat.
lmao
the bad spy enters the chat.
so what i do is that i hide outside the battlements, on to those props you can stand on outside the base, and once someone gets out of base, i try to stab their back, it only works like 70% of time, i think, and i don't play spy as much as i, used to. -sigend the scoot/snoiper man
 

King Apple!

Member
Jul 16, 2019
15
3
13
Trickstabs are awful. Why would you need to backstab someone unusually? Why do people don't play games like developers made it? Why do trickstabs exist?
I mean how would you make it? Also trickstabs exist bc spy doesn't have to always rely on his pistol while being chased by a pyro. They could instead corner stab and kill the pyro in one hit. Making it easier to deal with the pyro, or you could just have good aim... (trickstabbing cooler tho)
 

SL

Celebrity
Jun 2, 2019
350
125
123
I mean how would you make it? Also trickstabs exist bc spy doesn't have to always rely on his pistol while being chased by a pyro. They could instead corner stab and kill the pyro in one hit. Making it easier to deal with the pyro, or you could just have good aim... (trickstabbing cooler tho)
Well, why would you need to be cool by risking your chance to kill someone?
 

MrDevil101

Forum Activist
Jul 30, 2017
118
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Finland
I mean how would you make it? Also trickstabs exist bc spy doesn't have to always rely on his pistol while being chased by a pyro. They could instead corner stab and kill the pyro in one hit. Making it easier to deal with the pyro, or you could just have good aim... (trickstabbing cooler tho)

You don’t need to look cool while killing someone. As long as they’re dead idc how they die
 

Shimmy1

Newbie
Jun 8, 2020
1
0
11
I see trickstabs as a meme just like trolldier. Very inconsistent and unreliable way to beat your oponent. Also, as soon as you try matching with more experienced players, they just don't work, at all... There are probably 4 spyes in the world that can reliably do a metador on me. For fun I usaly stand still and let the spy mains butter me to death as heavy, so they get angry for not getting backstabs. I think people don't understand how spy works. His primary weapon is a revolver and not a knife, and the only time he should use it is with unaware enemys.


A year late but regardless, here's what I wanted to say: trickstabs =/= strafestabs; they're two different things entirely. A trickstab like a matador or a stairstab is like a onetime trick against your enemy; you do it to someone and they know for the next time they see you, they won't follow you up those stairs or chase you blindly. Strafestabs are different because even if you know about strafestabs and how they work, you can still get stabbed by them. Here's an example video of these strafestabs that I'm talking about:
.

Strafestabs are much more consistent than trickstabs because you're counting on your opponent to use his best movement (which manifests itself in the different ways people can strafe at you: towards you, away from you, around you, etc). What you're doing is countering his movement to stab him. It's a very consistent way to stab good players AND bad players (although it only applies if your opponent is strafing in some way; if they're just running straight at you with W, then matador them and if they're strafe running at you (pressing W and a strafe key), you strafe in one direction until you get the stab).

Here are two tutorials on strafe stabs:

Long one
Short one

One is a bite-size one that's short and gets to the point and other is a 5 part video series thats around 4 hours in total length. I recommend that you watch the first one because you can learn how to do a circle strafe stab right away. If you watch the second, you learn all the theory behind the circlestrafe stab and it's much much more succinct and full of information.