Whats the point of normal fists?

K.G.Bs are basically the old fists with the added extras, the only thing different is the actual gloves and taunt. So what's the point of having the normal fists... unless of course it's for newbies to enjoy or something

I'm not sure if you know that it's an unlockable and has reduced attack speed but if you kill someone with them you get 5 seconds of crits for any weapon.

Ah, reduced attack speed

I know it's a unlockable and all that jazz though.

Still, I don't think it's a big enough trade off

The taunt, duh.

POW

in reality, all of the melee weapon unlocks so far have been pretty much upgrades.  yeah, they've all had tradeoffs, but the fact is the normal melee weapons are almost never used, except by crazy gung-ho melee fighters.  so having, for example, less damage on the axtinguisher if someone's not on fire is not a big loss for someone who doesn't normally use the fireaxe anyway.  and heavys never use fists unless they're out of ammo (or again, crazy), so there isn't much they can do to give a disadvantage to the KGB's.

Really, I've come to expect all of the melees to be some cool looking upgrade rather than an alternative.  They may have to think of a higher trade off for engys and spys, but most will be considered "better".

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Not to say that the KGB isn't better in basically every way from the fists, but there is at least one situation I can think of where melee is a wise choice for fattys. If a pyro is rushing you Sasha isn't ready, fists are a good idea. The pyro will try to burn you in melee range and will recieve some serious paintrain from heavy knuckles. If you have full health or close to full health, you'll either kill the pyro outright or he'll run away. Bust out your shotgun if he routs and finish him off. The reason you don't want to start with your shotgun is that if he does run, you have less shots to nail him with as he jets.

I must say that so far all the melee unlockables have been balanced; although loads more fun to use than the basics.

I guess the speed on fists is a bit of an advantage, but you're right, the KGB is just better.

Of course, I think bareknuckle Heavy boxing matches are more fun than KGB because you're not critting, thus it'd require more skill.

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true, that is a good point, but in that situation i would still go with the shotgun from the start because A) the pyro may be smart and keep just out of melee range but inside flamer range and B) six close-range shotgun blasts should be more than enough to kill the pyro, even if you miss half of them.  but either way, the use of melee weapons is extremely rare on the part of Heavys, rare enough that a small decrease in attack speed isn't going to be much of a concern - with the KGB's  you can get in one hit and easily finish everybody in the room off with your crit shotty.