Characters / Team Fortress 2: The Sniper

Main Character Index
Offense Classes (The Scout | The Soldier | The Pyro)
Defense Classes (The Demoman | The Heavy | The Engineer)
Support Classes (The Medic | The Sniper | The Spy)
Non-Player Characters

The Sniper

Real name: Mr. (Mick?) Mundy/Mun-dee

"Keep yubbin' that big mouth, while it's still attached to yer bloody neck!"

Voiced by: John Patrick Lowrie (English), Ramón Rocabayera (Spanish), Mark Geichman (Russian), Jo Vossenkuhl (German)

"Professionals have standards. Be polite. Be efficient. Have a plan to kill everyone you meet."

The Sniper is a New Zealand-born marksman hailing from the Australian outback. Unlike his fellow "Australians", the Sniper is Lean and Mean and prefers to pop skulls from afar rather than dishing out vegemite sandwiches with his fists. He usually fancies himself to be something of a Cold Sniper and prides himself on his professionality, but can be just as abrasive and loony as his teammates. Raised by loving parents who disapprove of his job, the Sniper nonetheless keeps contact with them. The Sniper's official Team Fortress 2 Wiki page.Everyone, Meet the Sniper!

In short, the Sniper is a class specialized in taking out targets from a distance away. With 125HP, 100% base speed, a bolt-action rifle only holding one bullet at a time and a piss-poor SMG, the Sniper is nearly useless at short range. However, his rifle has a powered scope and can easily snipe enemies at great range with pinpoint accuracy to deal high damage, or kill any class in the game in a single uncharged headshot or fully-charged (by staying zoomed in long enough) body shot. The amount of time Sniper spends looking down a scope makes him a prime target for backstabbing Spies. His secondary slot can be filled with a tool supporting his sniping ability, and his melee weapon is a kukri.

The Sniper had to share his update with the Spy, which led to an Escalating War between the two characters.

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• Accidental Aiming Skills: In "Meet the Sniper," the RED Sniper shoots a BLU Heavy right through the head, but in doing so accidentally hits a bottle a Demoman behind the Heavy was drinking from. This leads to the top half of the shattered bottle being lodged in Demo's remaining eye, which leads to him stumbling backwards while blindly firing a few grenades in panic, and in doing so, flips over the railing behind him and lands on some explosive barrels below. At the same time, the 'nades Demo shot out a few seconds earlier bounce back on top of him and detonate, blowing up the barrels along with the hapless Demo. Even Sniper feels sorry for him, or at least intrigued at what just happened:
  Sniper: Ooh...
• Achilles' Heel:
  • Snipers might be good at killing their enemies from far away, but they can be completely obliterated when it comes to close range combat. Most classes can kill a Sniper easily at close range, but a good Soldier or Pyro in particular can murder a Sniper in seconds simply by getting close and going all out on them while the Sniper makes a futile attempt to fight back or run away. This weakness can be alleviated by getting good at Quickscoping heads for an instant 150 damage at close range, enough to instantly kill half the cast and leave the rest severely injured, but this requires a notable degree of skill and reflexes not easily learned by the average Sniper.
  • Because Snipers usually spend their time in one place trying to kill people from afar, they're usually dead meat for even the most amateur of Spies. While having a Razorback helps subdue a backstab, it's incredibly easy to notice, so a Spy is likely to just switch to their revolver and shoot the Sniper dead (or go for a headshot if they have the Ambassador equipped) to avoid the trouble of their backstab being blocked.
  • Scouts are very difficult targets to take out at long range (so long as their movements aren't too predictable), making them exceedingly frustrating for even a good Sniper to nail a headshot on. Combine that with Scout's strong close-combat effectiveness, and he can easily outmaneuver a Sniper from afar, then flank in and take him out before the Sniper has time to unscope.
• All-Natural Fire Extinguisher: Jarate, a jar of urine, can be used by the Sniper to extinguish himself and allies that were set ablaze.
• Ammunition Backpack: Carries a quiver of arrows when using the Huntsman.
• Assassin Outclassin': Sniper's primary counters are Spies and other Snipers. In fact, Sniper's are usually urged to kill the rival Sniper upon first sight in any fight to both save their team and themselves, the latter because a Sniper can't focus on headshotting the enemy team if he's dead.
• Awesome Aussie: The Sniper is not only Austrailian, but he's a skilled combatant whose range of effectiveness far outsizes every other class'. However, while he would fit the stereotype perfectly in real life, he doesn’t fully conform to his world's idea of a stereotypical Australian, being reedy, somewhat introverted, and lacking facial hair. The Sniper discovers why he's so different in "Blood in the Water": he was originally born in the Lost Country of New Zealand, but crazy circumstances led to him being adopted and raised by Australian parents. Finally achieving closure, the Sniper muses about his discovery out loud:
  Sniper: "It... It all makes so much sense now. Why I never grew a mustache or Australia-shaped chest hair. Why I never wanted to fist-fight like the other kids. I'd just sit in a tree and throw stones at them..."
• Ax-Crazy: Of The Stoic variety, but just listen to his deranged whispers when he gets revenge or the mad screaming he yells when dominating.
• Back from the Dead: Bled out between issues #4 and #5, but was resurrected by the Medic.
• Badass Boast: One of his competitive mode voice lines pins himself as the most effective member of Team Fortress.
  "Put any six blokes together, you'll get a job done. Got a Sniper? You get it done right."
• Being Personal Isn't Professional: His spiel, as shown in his "Meet the Team" video.
• The Bogan: Despite using "bogan" as an insult, he himself is shown to be a crass, disrespectful and profane individual (in the game proper) who have no problems flinging a jar of urine at anyone (including his allies). That said, he's a rare New Zealand version, instead of Australian.
• Boom, Headshot!: The core of the Sniper's gameplay is landing consistent, charged headshots to take key targets out of the fight. He's the only merc in the game to be able to do this aside from the Spy, who can only do so while equipped with the Ambassador. The "Meet the Sniper" video starts with him saying these two words as he flicks a bobblehead of the Civilian from Team Fortress Classic.
• Break Out the Museum Piece: The Bazaar Bargain is a Middle Eastern jezail that’s outdated by over a century by the time the game takes place, which was upgraded with some accessories with extra parts that keep all the new modifications in place. The sheer convenience of it all is lampshaded by its description during the update that introduced it.
  Can you believe the Sniper found an old bolt action rifle, a long piece of metal, some bolts, one half of a binocular and a military grade laser sight, ALL for just under three dinars?
• Breaking the Fourth Wall:
  • The vast majority of his generic domination quotes reveal that the Sniper is aware of the game's respawn mechanic. Here are some highlights:
    "How many times have you died? I'm actually getting impressed."
    "Kill ya again soon, mate."
    "See you in five minutes."
    "Where'd I get you that time? The liver? The kidney? I'm losing track."
    "I'm runnin' outta places to put holes in ya."
  • He is also aware of his unpopularity in competitive circles.
    "6s with a Sniper, eh? I guess you blokes wanna win."
    "'Bout time a Sniper showed up around here."
    "Who said Snipers don't belong in 6s?"
    "Y'know what this team could use? Five more snipers."
• Broken Pedestal: In Blood in the Water, upon discovering that he's adopted, he goes to meet his birth parents, only to discover that they're a pair of dimwitted scientists who not only tried to abandon him when he was an infant to save themselves, but also unintentionally caused the destruction of an entire nation. And then they proceeded to abandon him to save themselves again, visibly hurting him.
• Butt-Monkey:
  • BLU Snipers in the "Meet the Team" series tend to have comically bad luck. When a dramatic death is needed, a Sniper is killed — as opposed to a funny death (Heavy) or a Red Shirt (Soldier):
    • The BLU Snipers in "Meet the Engineer" get killed on-screen more than any other class (in rather humiliating ways as well). The ending reveals that the Engineer's campfire is in fact a BLU Sniper's burning corpse.
    • In an early concept of "Meet the Medic", a BLU Sniper dies dramatically in the arms of a BLU Soldier, seconds before the two get run over by a train.
    • The BLU Sniper in "Meet the Demoman" gets blown up by the RED Demoman's sticky bomb trap.
    • In "Meet the Spy", the RED Spy kills a BLU Sniper by stabbing him in the back, causing the Sniper's dead body to fall over a railing.
    • One Sniper in "Meet the Pyro" meets quite a brutal end. He is blasted out of an upper-story window by a fire backdraft, breaks his glasses and his legs on impact, and clutches someone's foot as he begs for help... only to find out that foot is the Pyro's, who fries the Sniper with their flamethrower at point-blank range.
  • In-game, many scoped-in Snipers are sitting ducks due to being deeply unaware of their surroundings. This makes them very popular targets for Spies, Scouts, jumping Soldiers/Demos, and taunt kills.
  • The Sniper's lot in life continues to worsen in "Blood In the Water": First, his parents died, followed by him finding out that he's adopted. Next, he finds his birth parents, only for them to be complete assholes. Then he gets shot as his former friend Medic looks on.
• Casual Danger Dialog: When searching for one of his targets in "Meet the Sniper", an enemy spots Sniper and starts shooting at him. Yet, Sniper remains calm and simply acknowledges what's going on.
  Sniper: I think his mate saw me...
  (cue bullets grazing the tower he's standing on)
  Sniper: Yes, yes he did!
• Charged Attack: The sniper rifle and its various replacements act as charged weapons. A Sniper must right-click to go into scoped mode (for rifles) or hold down the fire button (for the Huntsman) to charge up his primary weapon's damage. This is necessary to achieve the lethal headshot central to the class' play style, but it slows the Sniper down and often leaves him vulnerable due to a very narrow field of vision.
  • The Hitman's Heatmaker adds 'holding' type as well: as he acquires kills, the rifle charges a 'focus' meter which, when activated, removes the need to look away from the scope after firing and speeds up the charge rate of the weapon, making it more lethal.
• Charge Meter: His rifle charges while zoomed in on the scope. There's also his Cleaner's Carbine, which has a "Crikey" meter that increases with damage to enemies. Once full, Secondary Fire guarantees all weapons a Mini Crit for 8 seconds.
• Comical Coffee Cup: According to the "Meet the Sniper" video, he has a "#1 Sniper" mug.
• Cold Sniper: Zigzagged; Sniper is cold, cruel, and occasionally outright gleeful at killing his enemies, but he's also very down-to-earth compared to the rest of the classes.
  • His kill responses and original domination and revenge lines invoke the former trope by being quiet and reserved when scoped and loud and boisterous otherwise, but the class-specific dominations added in his class update are the same regardless.
  • Comes back again in "The Naked and the Dead" as he dispatches the Classic Sniper, who happens to have Spy dead-to-rights at the time. Once he's blown Classic Sniper's head off, he complains how a professional wouldn't have wasted time with a monologue or taunt, they would have gone for the kill; he actually isn't a hypocrite with this rule; most of his taunts and insults come after he's killed his target (I.E. through domination lines).
• Consummate Professional: As close as you're gonna get in this game series, anyway. It's hard for any character to be overly serious in this series, but the Sniper sure tries his darnedest.
• Cool Shades: Funnily enough, because they lack a bodygroup, his default aviators cannot be removed. As a result, if you equip a cosmetic item with eyeglasses, he will wear them over his regular ones.
• Crazy-Prepared: "Have a plan to kill everyone you meet."
• Crippling Overspecialization: The only class fighting in middle-to-long range, and one of the two capable of reliable one-hit-kills, but pathetically weak in close range.
• Critical Hit Class: A Headshot from the Sniper is usually a guaranteed critical hit, even if not fully charged. He also has the Jarate, which causes a 35% damage increase referred to as "mini-crits", and the Bushwacka, a knife that deals regular critical hits whenever it would otherwise "mini-crit".
• Cute Little Fangs: Watch him talk during "Meet the Sniper" and you can see his canines are significantly larger than normal, but not to the point that they stick out of his mouth.
• Dark and Troubled Past: Subverted. In "Meet the Director", the Director continually paints Sniper as a victim of society. However, Sniper is quick to assert that he enjoys his job, and it is implied that he was raised by doting, if later disappointed, parents.
• Death Is a Slap on the Wrist: In-universe. He actually does die as a result of getting shot in Blood in the Water, but he's revived by the Medic come "Old Wounds". Apparently he was dead for 12 hours.
• Difficult, but Awesome:
  • Other than the obvious issue of learning precision shooting, Snipers can be in real trouble if anybody gets close to them — Spies and Scouts are the common offenders. But with practice, a Sniper can become dangerous at close range too, since they learn to listen for Spies uncloaking nearby and can switch to melee quickly. Some Snipers also keep themselves busy by spy-checking those who pass their line of sight with a hasty bullet to the skull. They can also make Air Vents and Sewers useless by sniping down them instead of sitting up high. A sharp-eyed, smart Sniper can rack up the body count something chronic.
  • The quick-scope technique is an invaluable tool in the Sniper's arsenal, and it is almost mandatory at higher levels of play. It is extremely easy for the Sniper to grow tunnel-visioned when scoped in, allowing just about anyone to maneuver out of sight and kill the Sniper almost for free. Learning how to quickly zoom in on targets and pop off a headshot will give the Sniper a much longer lifespan while also racking up his kill-count.
  • The Huntsman is a very different primary for the Sniper that trades out many of his unique strengths in exchange for ones that are less obvious: rather than a reliably accurate long-range sniper-rifle, you trade it for a bow and arrow that can headshot people, but only fires projectiles that have a travel time and are affected by gravity, among other drawbacks that the item description doesn't tell you about (less raw damage per arrow compared to rifles, slower reloads, half the reserve ammo, etc.). Where it genuinely excels is in mid-range combat: due to having a significantly faster charge time, it's easier to land meaty headshots at full capacity during a tense mid-range skirmish where there's simply no time to quick-scope, with the damage a Huntsman headshot can do still exceeding most One-Hit Kill thresholds (between 150-360 damage — just about the only class that can survive that is an overhealed Heavy). Combined with how the Huntsman requires no tunnel-visioning scope and enables slightly more mobility (Sniper is slowed to only 45% of normal movement speed while charging instead of 27% with rifles, and he can jump while charging arrows), a Huntsman who can master its bizarre properties can still be ungodly lethal and oppressive, enabling him to play more aggressively rather than passively sitting in the backline.
• Diminishing Returns for Balance: One (maybe two on a large team) Sniper(s) is considered ideal to fulfill the precision elimination role: any more cripples the team significantly by taking away vital frontline units. Likely to prevent matches into devolving into never-ending sniper wars. This has become infamous enough that a common joke about ineffective, unbalanced teams is that it "needs more snipers." It's like Christmas morning, indeed.
• Dirty Coward: Discussed but subverted; the Sniper is most certainly not a coward, but the others seem to think he is because of his preference for long-range combat.
  Scout: Snipe that, ya frickin' coward!
  Soldier: You are a coward, and you died like one!
  Soldier: The next time you want to kill a man, look him in the eyes!
  Demoman: Dominated, you head-shotting Judas!
  Demoman: It's lads like you that give war a bad name!
• Disappointing Heritage Reveal: In the comics, upon discovering that he's adopted, the Sniper goes to meet his birth parents, only to discover that Lar-Nah is a dysfunctional alcoholic who hates her husband, while Bil-Bel doomed New Zealand, willingly escapes with the team's only escape submarine when the dome begins to collapse, and mooches on Sniper's money soon after they first meet. It's telling that when he's shown in the afterlife in the next issue, he's actually at peace with his death... with his foster parents, making it rather clear who he considers his actual parents.
• Early Personality Signs: He mentions that, as a child, he never wanted to fist-fight like the other kids, instead preferring to climb up trees and throw rocks at them from afar. Not only is this an early sign of his current profession, it's one of the early hints in his life that he's not Australian.
• Edible Theme Clothing: The Fruit Shoot cosmetic is an apple that The Sniper can wear in place of his hat.
• Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas: He's a mercenary that kills people as a job. Even so, despite that and the fact that his relationship with his father is rocky due to his dour view on his son being a "crazed gunman", he cares for his ma and pa.
  • "Meet the Sniper" shows that he calls them with some regularity.
  • In the "Meet the Director" comic, he's very pissed off when an anonymous source (actually the Administrator) sends him photos of his parents as a threat.
  • In "Blood in the Water," he's willing to risk drowning to save his birth father, whom he's only just met and who has made it clear is both an idiot and an asshole, from the flood threatening New Zealand.
  • In "Old Wounds", he has a touching conversation with his deceased adoptive parents in the afterlife. After Medic resurrects him, Sniper vows to kill the people who murdered them.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Sniper might be much more of a crazed gunman than he'd like to admit at times, but he does mean it when he says that professionals like him have standards. For instance, he always tries to kill his enemies as quickly as possible, and only ever screams at or insults them after they're dead. Reflecting the former, he has a bad outlook of the Classic Sniper, calling him a "sadist" after Classic Sniper shoots Spy in the gut and lets him suffer instead of cleanly finishing him off.
• Every Bullet is a Tracer: Normally, rifle rounds aren't visible, but the Machina and the Hitman's Heatmaker emit a brief tracer pathway with every shot, giving away the Sniper's position. This and the Machina's inability to fire un-scoped is what balances its higher overall damage and ability to pierce targets and the Hitmann's Heatmaker's damage penalty on body shots to its ability to continuously fire without unscoping in focus mode.
• Evil Virtues: Takes pride in his "standards" as a professional assassin, listed above.
• Expy:
  • An exaggerated Australian stereotype who has plenty of wilderness survival training, an affinity for big knives, and a collection of crocodile teeth. For another hint, say his name out loud: Mick Mundy. Replace one of the "M"s with a "D". Still don't get it? "Crocodile" Dundee.
  • His backstory and birth name is an homage to Superman's.
• Eye Am Watching You: Does this gesture in his I See You taunt, bringing two fingers to his eyes then pointing forward while saying the taunt name.
• Fedora of Asskicking: Sniper's default look has him with a nice fedora, and he's capable of shooting down most people from a distance.
• Foreshadowing: Word of Saint Paul is that Sniper prefers sheep to people (his first girlfriend was a sheep). Everybody knows Australia has lots of sheep, but New Zealand is the real butt of the jokes, with a 20/1 ratio...
• Friendly Sniper: On your team, he's this. That being said, he becomes friendlier when interacting with his teammates during taunts.
• Full-Frontal Assault: He spends most of "Old Wounds" and "The Naked and the Dead" without any clothes on.
• Glass Cannon: He can dish out massive damage with precision with only one shot, but he shares the title of lowest amount of health with the Scout, Engineer, and Spy (125 HP), and can be killed easily if spotted.
• Great White Hunter: Was this before taking his job, and still fancies himself as an example of such, albeit one Hunting the Most Dangerous Game. When his patience is taxed, he very quickly slips into being an Egomaniac Hunter.
• Good Scars, Evil Scars: As of the "Meet The Spy" short, the Sniper (be it BLU or RED) has the scar, that his nose and cheek received, that the BLU Sniper got before being killed by Red Spy.
• Guide Dang It!: The Huntsman oddly has no stats whatsoever as part of its description, leaving it up for the player to figure out all of its stats and unique behaviors on their own. Some things are fairly easy to intuit given the fact that it's a bow and arrow rather than a rifle, but a breakdown of all the major features it doesn't list:
  • Instead of instant hitscan-based bullets, the arrows fired are projectiles with travel time and fall parabolically to gravity.
  • Speed, distance, and damage of the arrow is determined by a charging mechanic which is faster than that of the rifle, doesn't require a scope, and allows Sniper to walk slightly faster and jump while charging, but it's also manual, provides no zoom, and charging for too long will strain Sniper's arm and cause the eventual shot to become highly inaccurate, though it can be cancelled without firing.
  • Arrows do less damage than sniper rifle bullets, but can still headshot — roughly 120 damage for a fully charged bodyshot and 150-360 damage for a headshot, compared to the respective 150 and 150-450 damage of the rifle. Due to the lack of a scope, arrows can headshot just about any time, even when firing at its most minimal of charge.
  • The Huntsman reloads slightly slower than with rifles, and is only able to carry half the amount of total ammo (12 arrows rather than 25 bullets).
  • Arrows can be lit alight by a friendly Pyro and some environmental elements (such as the torches on DeGroot Keep), causing them to inflict afterburn if they connect on an enemy. Firing the arrow or switching weapons extinguishes the arrow, but a charge with a lit arrow can be cancelled to preserve it. Oddly enough, lit arrows aren't extinguished by going underwater.
• Hair-Trigger Temper: A reliable, if temperamental, ally to his mates; an alternately rage-filled, sickly gleeful, and deadly serious threat to his enemies.
• Hidden Depths: Despite all the professionalism and coldness, he really just wants his dad to approve of him. This is best shown when his version of Heaven shows that he is very much relieved after his deceased parents tell him to keep doing what he does. His dialogue immediately after being brought back and the Grin of Audacity he wears also carry implications that he's completely prepared to die happily, now that he knows that his parents approve of him.
• Hitbox Dissonance: Arrows fired by The Huntsman have infamously wild hitbox registration mechanics, which is important due to it being the only projectile-based weapon in the game where headshots are meaningful. The short of it is that what registers as a "headshot" can be far more generous than what may be seen visually, where even if the arrow you fire visibly passes a few feet away from the target's head, there's a potential chance it will hit anyway.^note For a slightly more elaborate explanation: characters in TF2 have two types of hitboxes running at the same time: a segmented skeleton of "player hitboxes" that register all major areas on a character's body (including one for the head), as well as a much more generous "bounding box" which is used to detect certain general collisions, such as walking up to walls or Engineer buildings. Projectiles like the Huntsman arrows try to prioritize checking whether or not they hit a player hitbox, but if they only pass the bounding box, the game "magnetizes" the projectile to the closest available player hitbox, which may very well be the head hitbox. Because the size of the bounding box is identical on all classes, this makes Hitbox Dissonance especially noticeable on smaller classes like the Scout.
• Hypocritical Humor: Despite his advice to "be polite", he still throws piss at people as a weapon and his domination taunts are very impolite.
• Improbable Weapon User: Jarate is literally just a jar filled with Sniper's piss. Surprisingly useful for making opponents much easier to kill, exposing cloaked Spies, and putting out burning teammates (including himself).
• Ineffectual Loner: The Sniper is extremely skilled at his job and prefers to rely on himself, but during actual gameplay, even the best Sniper cannot win the game single-handedly.
• Insistent Terminology: In "Meet the Sniper", during a phone conversation with father, he insists that he's an "assassin", not a "crazed gunman". Being a crazed gunman is due to "mental sickness", he claims.
• Instant Death Bullet: With a fully charged headshot from most rifles, he's capable of doing this to any non-ubercharged class. Even a fully charge non-headshot can take down most classes in one hit.
• Jerkass: Double Subverted. According to him, sniping is just a job, and feelings don't enter into it. Professionals have standards. However, judging from some of his domination quotes, especially against the Heavy and the Spy (his sworn enemy), you can hear a lot of vitriol dripping from his voice as he screams at them, thus making him a hypocrite to his own rule.
• Kukris Are Kool: Wields one as his primary melee weapon.
• Lame Comeback: Possibly one of his responses to killing an enemy Spy.
  "I was never on your side either... wanker!"
• Land Down Under: The second part of Downunder; as of "Blood in the Water," he's revealed to be from New Zealand, explaining his lack of the usual Testosterone Poisoning associated with Australians.
• Lean and Mean: Especially in his domination lines to the Heavy.
• Leitmotif: The only class to lack an original one, instead having rearranged parts of the Magnum Force theme.
• Long-Range Fighter:
  • Of all the classes, the Sniper is without a doubt the king of long-distance fighting, almost inherently by definition. Most classes rely on weapons that shoot delayed projectiles or are designed for use in mid/close range, but Sniper's rifle stands out by having perfect accuracy, zero distance-based damage falloff, and instant hitscan, meaning as long as he has a line of sight to the enemy, he's extraordinarily deadly even if he's a continent away. His low health and reliance on slow Charged Attacks further encourage him to attack from a distance, and he has very limited options when it comes to directly fighting off close-ranged threats.
  • A Sniper wielding the Huntsman becomes one of the only classes with any range in Medieval mode, save for the Medic with the Crusader's Crossbow, or the Scout with the Sandman or Flying Guillotine. Beyond the inherent advantages of the weapon in this context, the game mode's sole map encourages the use of the Huntsman via torches that can light its arrow tips aflame.
• Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: They're strapped to his back, but they still count. The Razorback protects against one backstab attempt with 30 seconds in between uses (if a Spy ever actually tries stabbing one) and the Darwin's Danger Shield was reworked to reduce damage from incendiary sources.^note Prior to the Jungle Inferno Update, it would simply add 25 health and reduce bullet damage taken by 25%.
• Magikarp Power: The core function of the Bazaar Bargain; by default, it charges slower than the base sniper rifle. While its damage numbers are unchanged, it kills less consistently due to not being able to fire at full power as often, and will necessitate headshots for max kill potential. For every headshot kill though, the charge rate will increase, so once he racks up a few heads, it begins to fire at a speed that outpaces the base rifle, allowing for almost instantaneous charges at higher counts. Of course, good luck surviving long enough to see those benefits.
• Martial Arts Headband: The Master's Yellow Belt is a white belt tied around his head which was stained in what may or may not be Jarate.
• Mighty Glacier: An unconventional one, but he fits the bill. He possesses the only long-range hitscan weapon with the capacity to instantly kill any class, and considering how the game is mostly close to medium range combat, his long range makes it very difficult to harm him despite his mere 125 hp. A competent Sniper can lock down a hallway singlehandedly, where the best counter is either another Sniper or a Spy (the Mighty part). However, he lacks mobility and the slow transit time is considered his biggest weakness in 6v6 composition. (Glacier part)
• Mr. Fanservice:
  • He spends most of "The Naked and the Dead" comic shirtless or nude.
  • The Bushman cosmetic gives him large, exposed biceps and rips open his shirt (but leaves his vest on), revealing his chest and abs.
• Not Afraid to Die: After being brought back to life in "Old Wounds", he tells Medic that since he knows there's an afterlife, he isn't afraid to die, and thus is the most dangerous man on the island. He's not a Death Seeker, though; it wouldn't be professional.
• Not So Above It All: He claims to be polite, professional, and have no emotional ties to his work. However, his lines toward enemies are very rage-filled and rude, and has zero qualms flinging Jarate (read: jar of urine) on anyone.
• Oblivious Adoption: He had no idea his parents weren't his birth parents until after they died.
• Odd Friendship: Though they don't interact much, Sniper seems to get along well with Scout. They're seen giving a fist bump near the end of "The Sound of Medicine", and Sniper even seems sad when Scout dies in "The Naked and the Dead" (and is subsequently overjoyed when he comes back to life). The fact that Sniper is one of the few people who knows who Scout's actual father is might have to do with his friendliness towards the Boston boy.
• Oh, Crap!:
  • During Halloween Mode, most of Sniper's voice lines have him freaking out over the existence of magic, as he clearly has no idea how to deal with such an Outside-Context Problem.
  • During Vs. Saxton Hale Mode, he starts screaming in terror whenever the hulking Mann Co. CEO gets too close for comfort. After all, he's a Long-Range Fighter getting cornered by a man known for his extremely dangerous fists.
• One-Hit Kill: With the exception of some very specific circumstances ^note such as a Spy using the Dead Ringer, a fully charged headshot from most of Sniper's primary weapons will instantly kill enemies, even if overhealed.
• Other Me Annoys Me: Some of his domination lines show that he looks down on his opposite-team doppelgänger as an inferior pretender.
  The bullets come outta the slim end, mate!
  You call that sniping?
  Dominated, ya blind-eyed bastard!
  One Sniper to another, mate: give up!
• Perma-Stubble: He looks like he hasn't shaved in a couple of days.
• Professional Killer: It's part of the rivalry with the Spy, plus he believes professionals have standards.
• Ranged Emergency Weapon: His SMG (and to a lesser extent, the Cleaner's Carbine) are this to his trademark Sniper Rifle. Sniper is a character built almost entirely around his use of the rifle to zoom in on and headshot enemies from afar, but is extremely vulnerable if someone manages to close the distance. The SMG deals fairly middling damage per hit (in fact, it's actually lower than the pistol found with Scout and Engineer), but is decently accurate in mid-range, has solid firing and reload speeds, and overall performs much more reliably in a close-range fight where the rifle would be far too cumbersome. They're definitely just secondary weapons for a reason, but if a Sniper gets pounced on and can't wait for a headshot attempt, they can still get the job done.
• Real Men Wear Pink: According to the Christmas Cards, he enjoys knitting.
• Repetitive Name: The Sniper’s first name is revealed to be Mun-Dee in "Blood in the Water," It just so happens to be a homophone for the surname that his foster parents gave him: Mundy. Thus, his full name — Mun-Dee Mundy.
• Retreaux: The Classic is a primary sniper rifle based on the appearance and sound of the sniper rifle from Team Fortress Classic. Unlike Soldier's The Original (which is functionally just a reskin of the default rocket launcher), The Classic is made to function more closely to how it does in its original source material, requiring manual charging of your shots for them to deal increased damage, and it can be done without scoping in, though it slows Sniper down while doing so. It also causes enemies killed by its fully-charged shots to completely explode.
• Russian Reversal: In "Meet The Sniper", the RED Sniper ends up backstabbing the BLU Spy with his kukri. Needless to say, in-game, this is often the opposite of how it normally happens.
• Scars Are Forever:
  • The Sniper (of both teams, no less) has had a scar across his nose, cheek, and ear ever since "Meet the Spy", where the RED Spy cut the BLU Sniper's face with his knife before stabbing him in the back with it.
  • When Medic resurrects him from the dead in the comics, Sniper has a long, stitched-up scar on the front of his torso.
• Secret-Keeper: As of The Naked And The Dead, he's one of the few characters who is aware of Spy being Scout's father, though the same comic also implies that he already knew even before the events of the comic due to him trying to encourage Spy to talk to Scout when the latter is dying.
• Shoot the Mage First: After Medics, priority kills are enemy Snipers to make it safer for his team to advance, Demomen and Engineers to dismantle their traps and buildings, and possibly Heavies since they're such a bullet sponge to conventional weapons.
• Shoot the Medic First: Enemy Medics, especially with full charge are his top priority.
• Signature Headgear: His default outback slouch hat, as well as his aviator sunglasses.
• Simple, yet Awesome: When boiling the Sniper down to his basics as a class, all that's needed at most is smart positioning away from the frontlines, good aim, and knowledge on who to shoot first, compared to other classes who need more nuanced strategies. As a result though, Snipers can absolutely and utterly obliterate most classes instantly if they're good, effectively keeping an entire section of a map under their watch.
• Single-Use Shield: The Razorback protects him from a single backstab, though he can get a new one by going to the resupply room or waiting for it to regenerate after 30 seconds.
• Sinister Shades: His aviators are this for enemy Snipers.
• Situational Sword: The Bushwacka is very weak, but deals full crits during normal mini-crits. Combine with Jarate to pick off single targets at close-range. If you think you're good enough, combine with the Cleaner's Carbine, which gives eight full seconds of mini-crits after dealing 100 damage with it, which can be stored for the perfect opportunity.
• Sniper Rifle: Obviously, this is the Sniper's primary weapon.
• The Sociopath: While every TF2 character qualifies as one, The Sniper is a bit more of a self-proclaimed one in his "Meet The..." video where he openly eschews the usage of feelings in lieu of standards, at least on the battlefield.
  Sniper: "Feelings"? Look, mate, you know who has a lot of feelings? Blokes that bludgeon their wife to death with a golf trophy. Professionals have standards.
• Sophisticated as Hell: He goes into great detail in the art of assassination. Conversely, he also throws jars of piss at people.
• Stereotype Flip: An interesting meta example. He's not particularly unusual by the standard of a fictional Aussie in most settings, but by the standards of Australians in the TF2 universe, he's pretty weird. Most Australians we see are loud, proud, Ditzy Genius Bruisers built like brick houses and hairier than a grizzly who love physical combat, which couldn't be farther away from him. The comics ultimately reveal him to be a New Zealander raised by Aussies.
• The Straight and Arrow Path: Sniper's most unique primary weapon is the Hunstman (along with the Fortified Compound, a functionally-identical reskin), trading out his usual sniper rifle with a bow and arrow. In exchange for Sniper's long-range, perfectly-accurate hitscan rifle, the Huntsman fires arrows that require a brief charge before each shot, have a travel time, and fall parabolically, requiring players to Lead the Target and account for gravity while firing. The arrows can still headshot and annihilate enemies quickly, making Sniper more effective in mid-range skirmishes than long-range pickoffs.
• Superman Substitute: Heavily downplayed and parodied. His parents are obvious parodies of Superman's parents, with him sent off as a result of their incompetence. However, that’s as far as it goes, with him having no actual superpowers of his own.
• Tall Poppy Syndrome: One of his domination lines towards the Engineer seems to be this.
  "Not so smart with your brain outside your head, are ya?"
• Thicker Than Water: Cruelly averted. Upon realizing that his birth parents are idiotic jerks, he considers his foster parents as his real mom and dad, and would've preferred to stay in heaven with them if there weren't still things for him to kill.
• Tranquil Fury: While unscoped, Sniper tends to make loud, cheery taunts against his enemies as he kills them. But once he's in the moment, he shifts entirely into a low, venomous growl, with many of his domination one-liners being surprisingly sinister and intense for the game.
  "It's only gonna get worse, mate."
  "You shouldn't have even gotten outta bed."
  "Bloody hell, you're awful."
  "How many times have you died? I'm actually getting impressed."
• Urine Trouble: You will be if you're hit by his Jarate, as not only is it embarrassing and squicky to get hit by Jar Potty, it apples a debuff that causes any incoming attack to apply mini-crits, effectively providing free bonus damage for your enemies.
• Utility Weapon: The Sydney Sleeper trades out the potent lethality of the usual sniper rifle for the supportive utility of Jarate: it doesn't do full critical hits on headshots — only mini-crits — significantly lowering its damage potential, but it applies Jarate for a duration depending on the scoped-in charge, tied together by a faster charge speed. This means that you're less likely to instantly kill someone with deadly headshots, but you'll be more regularly soaking enemies in debuffs, softening them up for your teammates, and you don't have to be as accurate to land it. It also comes with the beneficial utility of Jarate in the form of extinguishing teammates, even when unscoped (due to a long-lasting bug).
• Useless Useful Equipment: The Razorback. It keeps you from being backstabbed, but it's such an obvious piece of equipment that any Spy worth his salt will just pull out his revolver. That being said, unless a Spy knows their way around using an Ambassador for headshots or has a critical hit stored on a Diamondback, being attacked by a revolver is still preferable to an instant kill with absolutely no opportunity to fight back.
• Why Couldn't You Be Different?: His adopted parents don't care for his career choice. He spends quite a bit of the video speaking on the phone to his unseen father, who seems to think that the Sniper's some kind of crazed gunman.
  • Irony: You unlock an achievement called "Not a Crazed Gunman, Dad" by killing three enemies that are trying to complete an objective in one life.
  • Eventually subverted in the comic when the then-dead Sniper meets his adopted parents in heaven and being told that they are proud of him... although the Medic claims it's probably just a posthumous hallucination.
• Workaholic: Apparently being dead for twelve hours was "the longest holiday I ever took".
• [Verb] This!: Several of his responses after killing a Spy goes along these lines.
  "Sneak around that, ya phony scoundrel!"
  "Spy on that, ya fancy bloody wuss!"
• Vocal Evolution: Sniper's voice has gradually gotten much deeper and more growly, which can be especially noticeable when hearing his voice lines from Halloween and Mann vs. Machine maps.
• Voodoo Doll: He has a voodoo doll of the Spy called the Itsy Bitsy Spyer, which he shares with the Engineer. There's also a voodoo doll of himself ^note along with Scout and Demoman in the "Pin Pals" cosmetic for the Soldier and Pyro.
• Worm in an Apple: The Fruit Shoot (an apple that Sniper can wear as a hat) has the option to have a worm coming out of it.
• You Have Researched Breathing: The "Ritzy Rick's Hair Fixative" is basically Sniper without his hat.
• Younger Than They Look: Being one of the few classes with visible wrinkles on their face, one wouldn't be at fault for thinking the Sniper is somewhere in his late 30s to mid 40s. "Blood In The Water" reveals that he's only 31 at most, making him not much older than the Scout. Since "Blood In The Water" is set in 1972, and the game itself is set in 1968, Sniper in-game is only 27 at most.

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"Dad.... Dad p-, yeah - put Mum on the phone!"
-Sniper trying to end a phone call

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