Team Fortress 2 – Righteously Wielding the Righteous Bison

Introduction

(For maximum meme, this guide will be focusing on using the Righteous Bison as your main source of damage.) 
 
Trying to clap cheeks with crappy weapons is one of my favorite pastimes. In fact, I have been using almost nothing but the Righteous Bison for three months and I am suffering immensely, please send help. However, this has also allowed me to gather a vast wealth of knowledge and enlightenment regarding this pitiable weapon, and I will now share that wealth with you in an effort to justify all of my blood, sweat, and tears. 
 
If you doubt my experience, see my degree: 
 
 
 
 

Part 1: Righteous Stats

Before deliberating over big-brain strategy, let’s take a look at the Bison’s bare stats relative to those of the stock shotgun since Valve never bothered to do the whole thing themselves: 
 

(Approximate values relative to a face-full of lead) 
 
Every shot deals 24 damage per hit at point-blank or 11 damage per hit at maximum fall-off. Basically, this gun shoots slower, shoots less, and hits weaker than just about anything else in Soldier’s arsenal (besides the Mantreads, I guess?). On the bright side, the infinite ammo actually does help a bit since all the people you failed to kill won’t be dropping any ammo packs for you. 
 
That’s all quite sad, but this is simultaneously rectified and exacerbated by the completely alien laws of physics under which the Bison operates. Instead of relying upon simple boolet to kill lead-poisoned idiots in the desert, the Bison dares to use a single, slow-moving, transient wave of unexplained phenomena to do the same exact thing. Let’s see what this entails: 
 

 
The painfully slow projectile speed is the kicker. Despite its purpose as a means to hit the same enemy multiple times, it is perhaps the Bison’s greatest obstacle to achieving viability due to the simple fact that one needs several seconds of foresight to hit anything with them. Pairing this tragic fact with those awful stats could not possibly have been an accident; in fact, I suspect that it was a calculated move by Valve in an effort to prevent the pre-nerf Bison’s sheer, festering power from becoming completely uncontrollable in the future. 
 
 
A glimpse of what could have been. 
 
Still, I’m convinced that traces of that former power remain in today’s Righteous Bison, hence my quest to extract even a fraction of that sweet, righteous might. 
 
 
 

Part 2: Righteous Strats

The winning strategy when using any weapon is to maximize its strengths and minimize its weaknesses, though this is admittedly difficult when the weapon hinges on how abysmally awful your opponent’s reflexes are. Let’s see, then, where the Bison’s untapped potential lies: 
 
 
 

↳ Using its precious strengths

PENETRATE YOUR FOES 

• The Bison’s greatest strength is its ability to potentially hit multiple foes multiple times, which technically allows it to do many, many times the amount of damage dealt by your shotgun in the same situation… just distributed among many, many enemies. That’s basically what the rocket launchers do, though, so the Bison’s big shtick ends up not being very shticky after all. 
   
• One thing that the Bison does have over rocket launchers is the fact that its lasers penetrate teammates as well. In fact, of all the ways to use the Bison, spamming lasers from behind your beefcake teammates is among the least inviable. 
   
• In my experience, the lasers almost always hit each enemy twice. Your opponent needs to be sprinting pretty hard straight at or away from you to be hit just once, or indeed, to be struck by the fabled Triple Skewer. 
   
• For maximum effectiveness, fire the Bison into a line of Scouts running in the opposite direction and watch them all take 33 damage. Nice!

 
BEDAZZLE THE ENEMY WITH YOUR INVINCIBLE PROJECTILES 

• The Bison is so seldom used that most enemies won’t even know what’s being shot at them. Goad foolish Pyros and Short Circuit Engies into wasting their time and ammo trying to alter the immutable path of your meme lasers.

 
SHOVE THE BISON DOWN THEIR CHOKEPOINTS 

• Due to the nature of projectiles on top of your infinite ammunition, spamming the Bison into high-traffic areas is a solid idea that will net you at least 22 damage per minute.

 
OUTPERFORM SHOTGUNS AT LONG RANGE 

• Assuming that you can lead your shots several months in advance, the Bison causes much more damage than shotguns at mid-to-long range thanks to its multi-hitting projectiles and complete lack of bullet spread.

 
HUMILIATE YOUR ENEMIES 

• This is why people use the Bison. 
   
• Unlike [insert literally any other Soldier weapon here], the Bison is not viewed as a crutch but rather as a self-amputation. The handicap is so massive, in fact, that upon dying to a stray Bison laser, your foes will be forced to relinquish their Gamer status, and unless they take up the Bison or other equivalent meme weapon, no amount of domination medals will ever wash away the shame.

↳ Mitigating its crushing weaknesses

Let us also examine the Bison’s many weaknesses in an effort to understand and overcome them. After all, as our wise friend once put so eloquently: 
 
 
Paraphrased. 
 
Increasing damage output 

• As aforementioned, the Bison’s greatest potential lies in its ability to penetrate foes. As such, the Bison is not a dueling weapon; it can only truly shine compared to the shotguns and reach the lofty heights of mediocrity when facing down clusters of foes. This humorously implies that a lone Bison solly has the potential to halt a large push with as much ease as if he were fighting a single enemy… which is to say, with incredible difficulty. 
   
• Maybe shove a Kritzkrieg Medic up your a*s? 
   
• If you can’t afford to go full meme overdrive, use a rocket launcher to soften your foes up and knock them into the air first, where you can easily predict their path and line up that delicious Bison finisher… Huh? You mean that’s how you’re supposed to use a secondary weapon?

 
Dealing with the slow projectile speed 

• This is the Bison’s greatest weakness and the mightiest barrier to be overcome if one intends to master it. Learning to lead your shots by ridiculous margins and playing anime-level mind games with your opponents are absolute necessities. 
   
• If you don’t have the time or motivation to cultivate an extra 100 IQ just to reliably hit a juking Heavy for 22 damage, consider playing on chokepoint-heavy maps such as Turbine, where you can easily forcefeed sci-fi magic to anyone fool enough to invade the majestic Bison’s territory.

 
Accepting the fact that you are not threatening 

• The Bison is advertised as a "coward punisher" that hits retreating enemies more times than advancing ones. Unfortunately, you’d be hard-pressed to find anyone who flees at the sight of the pew-pew meme gun, so you may have to rely on your teammates or whip out your australium Black Box for intimidation purposes. Or just don’t bother because the laser always hits twice anyway. 
   
• In fact, by relying on something so sad as the Bison, you basically lose your identity as the Soldier and become known as his distant, taser-touting cousin. You are no longer an intimidating presence, and your slightly above-average health pool will be gone in no time. 
   
• Perhaps a better approach for a roaming solly, then, would be to go in the opposite direction and take a page from Spy Tzu’s The Art of Cowardice: simply be behind your opponent in the first place. In lieu of cloaking, rocket jumping can be used to get behind enemy lines and even reach unexpected hidey holes from which you can pounce upon unsuspecting prey to varying effect.

 
Dealing with sentries 

• Yet another staple of soldiering is completely lost upon swearing the Bison oath, and that’s sentry busting. The Bison truly is useless against buildings, so don’t even bother because you’ll just look sad trying. Instead, try these fun approaches: 
   
  For normies who won’t fully commit to the meme:
  • Play peekaboo with a decent rocket launcher.

   

  For Chads:
  • Use the Cow Mangler’s charged shot to disable sentries before whacking them.

   

  For Giga-Thads:
  • Use the Rocket Jumper to swoop in close behind or on top of sentries before whacking them.

 
Bemoaning the lack of passive support items 

• The Bison takes up the secondary slot, so you couldn’t give it a crutch like the Buff Banner even if you wanted to.

 
Projectiles colliding with random invisible map geometry 

• As if the Bison wasn’t already beaten three feet into the dirt, its projectiles are also stopped by invisible matter that manifests around certain ramps. Examples include the ramps next to both second points on Gullywash, several staircases on Barnblitz, and both of the center room stairs on Turbine to a lesser extent. 
   
• See Shounic’s video to enbiggen your brain on the subject: 
   

   

Summary (Too Righteous; Didn’t Read)

Strengths: 

• Lasers penetrate enemies and phase through teammates 
• Projectiles can hit the same foe multiple times 
• Half-decent spamming potential 
• Most enemies won’t have the vast knowledge of the Bison’s abilities as you do 
• Unrivaled humiliation tool

 
Weaknesses: 

• Underwhelming damage vs. single targets, despite multi-hitting projectiles 
• Small clip size 
• Slow firing speed 
• Painfully slow projectile speed 
• Complete impotence vs. buildings

 
Strategies to consider: 

• Use against clusters of enemies 
• Limit enemy’s maneuverability by hanging around chokepoints 
• Lead your shots by dummy huge margins 
• Spam down high-traffic areas 
• Spam from behind your beefcake teammates 
• Laugh at airblasting Pyros and Short Circuit Engies as they try to stop your lasers 
• Use as a humiliating finisher to the rocket launcher 
• When going full meme, use with the Rocket Jumper for maximum maneuverability 
• Get behind unsuspecting enemies 
• Don’t look at sentries 
• Beware invisible, laser-deleting map geometry

Conclusion

Learning to properly wield the Righteous Bison is an art and a science that will garner you profound respect from your teammates and foes alike. You know, unless they’re mad that you basically threw the match. 
 
If you would like to master some of the other meme weapons, go watch Bad Weapon Academy. As of writing this, ol’ FishstickOnAStick has not yet made an episode on the Righteous Bison, a spectacle that I can only assume is being saved for the grand finale. For that reason, I’ve made this needlessly long and convoluted guide for you to ogle in the meantime. 
 
Never forget that even if the Bison has been forsaken and forlorn by Valve, it shall always remain Righteous in our hearts. 
 
 
 

This is all about Team Fortress 2 – Righteously Wielding the Righteous Bison; I hope you enjoy reading the Guide! If you feel like we should add more information or we forget/mistake, please let us know via commenting below, and thanks! See you soon!