Flame Thrower

Flame Thrower
Kill Icons
Basic Information
Used by	Pyro
Slot	Primary
Loadout Stats
Flame Thrower Flame Thrower Alt-Fire: Release a blast of compressed air Airblast pushes enemies, deflects projectiles, and extinguishes burning allies "Things are heating up..."

The Flame Thrower is the default primary weapon of the Pyro. It is an improvised conflagration device constructed out of metal poles and a team-colored gas nozzle connected to a propane tank. The flames produced are always red regardless of which team the user is on. Enemies on fire will have their flames tinted their team's color.

The Flame Thrower is a highly unusual weapon. Instead of firing projectiles or bullets, it releases a short-range stream of large flame particles that linger in the air and quickly expire, basing their damage on how long the oldest touching particle was alive. It will release around 25 particles a second, with brand-new particles dealing 7.2 damage each, and old particles dealing 3.6 each, scaling linearly between the two. This roughly corresponds to the user's distance from their target. These particles will continue on their trajectory even as the player moves, and adjust their speed based on the player's movement, allowing for wide coverage around them. The flames penetrate through enemies and buildings, meaning opposing players cannot shield each other from the fire. Damage scaling is also different from other weapons, as there is no ramp-up or falloff, and critical hit damage is affected by particle lifetime scaling. The Flame Thrower will not fire flames underwater, and will not damage underwater enemies if the user is above the surface. It will also light friendly Huntsman arrows on fire, allowing them to deal afterburn.

When an enemy is set on fire (except for Pyros), they will suffer a status effect called afterburn, in which they will continually take damage and scream for their life. This has the crucial effect of revealing cloaked or disguised enemy Spies. Afterburn deals 3 damage and triggers twice per second for ten seconds, for a total of 60 damage. This will also persist after the Pyro's death, unless they have the Harvester equipped. Critical afterburn does not exist, but it will deal mini-crit damage if the user has a mini-crit boost, or the victim is Marked for Death. Afterburn is extinguished after one second if they are being healed by a beam, like a Dispenser, the Payload, or the Medi Gun. Afterburn is extinguished immediately if the victim takes a health pack, meets a resupply cabinet, submerses themself in deep water, has a Medi Gun ÜberCharge, or is airblasted by an ally.

If the user presses the alternative fire key, the Flame Thrower will use 20 ammo to release a massive cone of compressed air, known as "compression blast" or more commonly "airblast". This cone deals no damage, but forcibly pushes back enemies (but not buildings), launching them in the air if angled upwards. The airblast can be fired once every 0.75 seconds, including underwater, trapping any enemy that simply cannot kill the Pyro. The airblast isn't powerful enough to offset the effects of gravity, so an enemy cannot be kept in the air indefinitely. However, airblasts from multiple Pyros will increase the velocity against an enemy. In addition, the airblast will reflect (most) enemy projectiles towards where the user is aiming, the most important of such being rockets and grenades. If reflected, the projectile will (usually) deal mini-crit damage against enemy targets, and if the projectile (or the Pyro) was crit boosted, then that projectile will also be crit-boosted. When a Pyro kills an enemy with a projectile belonging to their team, a unique kill icon will appear, and the Pyro will receive kill credit. As a final bonus, the airblast will extinguish teammates who are on fire - hopefully before they burn to death while staring right at you.

Properties

Properties
Shot type		Particle
Damage type		Fire
Ranged or Melee?		Ranged
Taunt		Triumph
Damage
Critical		21.6 / particle 10.8 / particle
Mini-crit		4.86 / particle
Mini-crit (ramp-up)		9.72 / particle
Flame damage (close)	100%	7.2 / particle
Flame damage (far)	50%	3.6 / particle
Status Effects
Effect		Afterburn
Afterburn		3 / tick
Afterburn (mini-crit)		4 / tick
Afterburn duration		10 s
Ammo
Loaded		200
Function Times
Attack interval		0.04 s
Airblast interval		0.75 s
All values are approximate.

Names in other languages

Language	Name	Meaning
Bulgarian	Огнехвъргачката	Flame Thrower
Spanish	Lanzallamas	Flame Thrower
English	Flame Thrower	-
French	Lance-flammes	Flame Thrower
German	Flammenwerfer	Flame Thrower
Italian	Lanciafiamme	Flame Thrower
Brazilian Portuguese	Lança-chamas	Flame Thrower
Romanian	Aruncător de flăcări	Flame Thrower
Russian	Огнемёт	Flame Thrower
Ukrainian	Вогнемет	Flame Thrower

Update history

2.0.0

• Flamethrower^(sic) is now lag compensated. This should dramatically improve flame hit detection at higher latency values.
• Improved the Pyro’s Flamethrower^(sic) aimmatrices to match up with the Flame’s hitboxes better.
• Improved Arrows to be ignited mid-air, both by triggers and the Pyro's flames.

2.0.1

• Made flames and airblast register more reliably
• Fixed the GRN flamethrower^(sic) particles
• Updated players to say "Thanks" when extinguished from afterburn

2.0.2

• Afterburn length is now 25% shorter, though total damage output is unchanged
• Fixed flame impact sounds on friendly buildings
• Fixed a bug where flames would linger between round changes or restarts

2.0.4

• The hitbox for Pyro's airblast is slightly shorter in its duration, and is now 4 ticks (from 6.6)

2.1.0

• Lowered damage by 12% (150 DPS, from 170)
• Support score for extinguishing is now based on remaining afterburn
• Support score for airblasting is now based on amount of damage deflected
• Support score is now awarded for destroying stickies, disarming Dynamite Packs, and airblasting Dynamite bomblets
• The airblast sound effect is now only played once on the attacker instead of being multiplied by targets (e.g. Stickybombs)

2.1.2

• Fixed cases of Flame Thrower flames going through thin walls or floors

2.1.3

• Raised afterburn condition duration for Pyros to 0.5s (from 0.25s)
  • This allows for Flaregun^(sic) combos in certain situations
• Damage over time conditions (bleed, afterburn) no longer apply on the very same tick as damage

2.1.4

• Fixed Flame Thrower airblast overriding custom visual effects

2.1.5

• Fixed airblast sound sometimes not emitting properly

Comparisons from Team Fortress 2

• To preserve Team Fortress 2 Classic's 2007–'08 vision of TF2, the Flame Thrower has some of its features and properties restored prior to the Jungle Inferno update in 2017 from Live Team Fortress 2. The Classic version has the following changes:
  • Restoring Flamethrower's maximum-duration afterburn on contact. Live version's afterburn duration is based on how long the target is in contact with direct flames.
  • Restoring compression blast's hit detection box for projectiles and hit detection cone for players.
  • New flame particles created for Classic.