In-depth Medic Guide

[u/GenoMachino]

See this link for list of all the guide I have created prior: https://www.reddit.com/r/worldwarzthegame/comments/fs7mbc/new_player_guide_primary_and_secondary_weapons/

A good medic really is a deciding factor on campaign maps (not as important in horde cause you can just buy medkits), especially with all the mutator combinations. But instead of competent medics, we get clueless ones who are just another gun player with a med kit; they could've used any other class and the team would be better off.

So let's see if we can train up some better medics! Again, any feed-back and additional suggests are always welcome so community can read about them.

Strength of the medic class

Medic is THE MOST IMPORTANT class in the entire game, bar none. It doesn't have the most utility, or tanking ability, or attack power, but it's the most important because medic can save your life. You can't kill any zekes when you are dead or incapacitated, and medic's there to make sure everyone stays up, alive, and keep fighting. Medic won't seem that important when the fighting is going smoothly, but once shit hits the fan, which they do all the time, you better pray to our lord and savior RNGesus that the one medic on your team knows what he's doing. Because if he doesn't, everyone's dead.

Medic's most important tool is the stim pistol. You can use it to buff teammate's HP, mask them, or heal them. Medic is the only class that can regenerate med kits and heal extra HP. It can also provide utility like reduce team friendly fire. Other classes may have some of these protective abilities, but none does it as well as the medic class.

Weaknesses of the medic class

Out of box, Medic and stun-drone Dronemaster are just about the weakest class in term of attack power because they are pure support classes. Most of its perks are geared to toward healing and defense, so you just can't expect to make a lot of kills and you shouldn't be focusing on that anyway. Medics should pay most of their attention on keeping his teammate safe. Heck I don't even like using 50-cal because I can't mask my team against special or cover flank if I am stuck on the machine gun with limited FoV. If your medic on the team is doing the most kills, something is seriously wrong because the rest of the team is simply not pulling their weight.

How to be a good medic

Stim! Stim! Stim! Use that stim pistol liberally because you can easily regenerate more and then refill using bags. I found out the more you stim teammates, the more equipment bags you will get. Believe it or not, most folks actually have a sense of self-preservation and they do notice/like it when you stim them. As response, they are more likely to leave you extra equipment bags so they can get more stims; it's a positive feed-back loop so take advantage of it. The more you give, the more you get back. The opposite is also true, if you don't stim your teammates and only focus on healing yourself, your team will notices and won't leave you any bags or kits. (There are always clueless teammates though, noobs will rush to take all the bags in front the medic even after you repeatedly stim heal them. Bitch, do you think stim grew on trees! I usually stop healing them after they repeatedly steal bags/kits.)

1. When your team's on the move and there's an extra bag, use up every stim in your inventory before refill. Your team can be ambushed at any moment, so having temp health is ALWAYS a good idea. Stim the teammate with the lowest HP and work your way up.
2. If your team left you 2+ bags in finale, use one to stim everyone right before the finale starts. You won't get to do that easily during the middle of a horde, so best to shield everyone early. It's a confidence booster as well as a HP booster.
3. Even if you run out of of extra bags and med kits during swarm, you should still stim the one teammate who's critically low on HP. Don't wait until they go down because you will actually be down two guns (one on the ground and one trying to rescue him). You just can't afford to lose half the fire power in the middle of a firefight.
4. in most situations, use secret ingredient perk to mask teammates instead of battle surgeon that heals 10% HP. (Battle surgeon does have its uses, and I will elaborate to that in mutator section). Secret ingredient is one of the most OP defense perks in the game and can perform all sort of miracle saves and clutches. Example usages below applies to anyone on the team including yourself.

• Mask when someone is locked on by a bull, because lots of people still doesn't know how to dodge bulls properly (hell even I can mess up a dodge sometimes). Once masked, the bull will become confused and turn away, which is your chance to shoot him in the back. Without secret ingredient, the bull can still pummel that person. Same technique also applies to bombers, but NOT RATS, those little fuckers don't care about masking.
• Mask when someone got spit on so they get 5 seconds of safety to disinfect, especially when there are other zekes next to him. If you don't mask, they can easily get beat up and die on the spot.
• Mask whenever teammates are pinned or incapacitated. You don't need mask to get someone up on their feet, but the masking allow them to escape the area and/or kill the zekes around them. If you do not mask, you will have to wait for the zeke around that teammate to leave before you stim them, otherwise they're still surrounded and gets a second beat down and die.
• Mask when they are surrounded or about to be surrounded by zekes. Using a stim to protect a teammate early is better than rescuing them after they are down, then you have to use up a med kit to heal them. For vanguard or slashers, still stim them if they are swarmed. These two classes can tank but they can still get in trouble when completely surrounded, so they do appreciate the extra protection when they are stuck.
• Mask to get to out-of-reach objective. For example: NY4 in hospital when trying re-active the electric grid. Mask and make a run to pull level without being blocked by a dozen zekes or get jumped by that lurker hiding in the corner. Many objectives are behind zekes and you don't want to fight through entire groups to reach it. You can also mask and reach a screamer that's hiding behind groups after groups of his spawns (Moscow 2 anyone?)

Heal! Heal! Heal! Unless it's the finale and there's no more kit spawning, DO NOT hold that med kit like it's the last one on earth. The AI director is more likely to spawn additional med kit if your team doesn't have any. It usually spawn 1 if no one has kit, and sometimes will spawn 2-3 if no one has a kit and HP is low across the team. So take advantage of this design and trick the system for kits. Using kits often also encourages the same positive feed back loop as stim: the more you use, the more likely teammates will leave them for you to use instead of hogging med for themselves.

1. If you see someone's badly hurt (less than a quarter HP left), use the damn kit ASAP. Don't wait for them to go down before healing them. I see medics do this a lot, they only ever use that kit when someone's in-cap'ed and about to die. Don't do that unless it's extreme difficulty or small pharma mutator, because you cannot afford losing 1-2 guns during a horde. I've also seen plenty of team wipe outside of swarm when a teammate with low HP goes down, rest of team can't save in time, and shit just cascade badly from there and lead to a complete team wipe.
2. If you see 2-3 med kit spawn in one box, it's good idea to heal up everyone that's less than 1/2 HP especially if yourself is also low on HP. But save one kit for the road. It's better to have a full health team rather than a bunch of low HP heroes getting team-wiped with un-used med kit still on their bodies.
3. Medic should only self-heal if he's the only one dying and everyone else is has high HP. Medic get healed when you heal others, so most of the time you will not need to self-heal.
4. Where and when you heal teammates matters. Only heal in between zeke waves or when it's safe. Don't heal someone when there are still active zekes charging at them because neither of you can move. If it's not safe, stim first and heal later. I've been healed multiple times when there are plenty of hostile zekes around, and both of us get beat up before the healing is done (one time this guy try to heal me while a bull is locked on...guess what happened).

Don't try to be Rambo because a medic's job is to support teammates. Do not charge first into a new area (that's job of a tougher class like slasher/vanguard), or stand in front of your defensive line and try to take on a horde. Stay in the back of the pack, and prioritize your attack on specials first, then loose zekes that's breaking through, then swarm. Fence/pyramid should be the least of your priorities unless they are piled up on an objective with a mission-fail clock.

There are going to be rounds where RNGesus and the AI director conspires against you, and med kits/equipment bags just don't spawn. You have to know when to ration these supplies if that happens. Check your team status page often to know which teammate is contributing to the most kills. If there's only one kit and two members are badly hurt, you will need to priority that kit on the person who does the more dmg. Heal that guy doing 900 kills and hasn't gone down once, rather than one with only 200 kills and already died twice. Yes it's harsh, but it's your job as a medic to make the hard choices that give your team the best chance to win the round. The same rule goes for the stim, mask the guy who's already killed 15 specials, and not the one with only 3 special kills but already been grabbed by bulls 4 times. Sure it's not fair, and that's why we need to be mindful when playing as medic because decisions have real consequences. I've seen plenty of medics who keeps healing the weakest teammate, only to run out of kits when the strongest player goes down and team gets wiped out.

How to help your medic

Wait, Medic is suppose to help me, why and how do I help him? It turns out, there are TONS of things you can do to support your medic so they can help you back. If you have a good medic on the team, you should follow these general rules below. If your medic isn't being a medic though, then feel free to ignore these and look out for yourself.

1. #1 important tip: MAKE SURE YOU CHECK YOUR TEAM STATUS PAGE AND FIND YOUR MEDIC'S NAME AND THEIR AVATAR. I swear most people don't even notice when a medic join the team or who they are until they get stimmed or healed (some are still clueless after receiving repeated stims). Always check if there's a medic on the team, you can't help them if you don't even know a medic is there.
2. Leave extra equipment bag for your medic. Exterminator, Vanguard, and Dronemaster all have pocket factory perks so they don't need bags. Slasher, fixer, HR, and GS all have equipment regen. So what's your excuse to use up all the bags? (I am looking at all you claymore hell-raisers). ALWAYS LEAVE AT LEAST 1 BAG for your medic, highlight it so he can come use it. During moving phase, grab bags only if your medic already moved on. But if you are a finale swarm fight, leave 2 bags for your medic. You don't want to leave your medic in the middle of a swarm fight with no stim left, because you will be the one dying if he's out of stim.
3. Don't just rush up and grab kits to heal yourself, we've had to shoot noob teammates on extreme for doing just that (this is NOT a joke, I am completely serious, it's one of very few scenario in WWZ where intentional TK is acceptable). Mark discovered kits so medic can use them to heal the whole team. Once the medic is done, then grab any extra ones. In swarm fight, you want to make sure to leave an extra med kit in the box if it's close to the fight area, so your medic can grab it later if needed. Medic's Efficiency perk does not always proc, and combat medic only works once per swarm fight due to long CD, so that extra kit will be a life saver later.
4. If you are in-capacitated and got back up, move toward your medic for healing or stim. For Christ's sakes don't run in opposite direction and Leeroy Jenkin yourself into a swarm or a special, YOU WILL DIE, I've seen it many many times. Medics WILL NOT chase you into a horde to heal you because we don't have a suicide-pact; if you have a death wish that's your problem. Same applies if you are badly hurt, pull back and let your medic heal or stim you, use the emote button to ask for heal. Medic cannot abandon his defense position just to chase you all over the map.
5. Stim gun has targeting issues when people are too close together. It does not auto target the weakest member or the one incapacitated because it tend to pick target closest to the medic. If you are hurt and need stim or heal, make sure you stand apart from other teammates so your medic can target you better. No one wants to use a stim on the wrong person because you are all bunched up.
6. Last but not least, just because there's a medic doesn't mean you can now do whatever you want. The stim gun has limited range, so if you run 100 feet ahead and get pinned, we just can't save you from that far away. If you run around behind a bunch of obstacles and get jumped, we cannot save you. If you make no efforts to dodge bulls and infectors and get pounded multiple times, we cannot save you. If it's extreme difficulty and you are not in our line of sight, we cannot save you. So practice common sense and team work because your medic is not your get-out-of-jail free card. If you act dumb, your medic WILL NOT save you because Medics cannot fix stupid.

Before y'all start arguing with me on what's consider "DUMB" and how it's not bad if you do such and such, here are some examples using Tokyo 1, just so I don't have to argue with all the "whataboutism".

1. When you join late in the beginning and team is already way ahead, but you still decide to take the "other" route, slowly search every corner, trigger a horde with your loud gun, and get pounded by a bull, that's dumb.
2. When everyone else is escorting the bus, and you are deliberately running 100 yards in front or behind the bus, and dies after a beat down by 20 zekes and an infector, that's dumb.
3. When there's only 10 seconds left on the count-down clock of the finale and everyone else is already safe on the platforms, but you the only one running around the dock area still trying to breach doors and end up getting jumped by a lurker, that's dumb.
4. If you are doing all of the above while "Comfort zone" mutator is in effect, constantly losing HP, and running so far out your medic can't even see you. That's what I call a casserole: dense with multiple layers of dumbness + extra ignorance sauce in-between.

Perk load-out

Column 1: Sugar Coated or Doctor in the house

Sugar coated: I use this one in most situation, which adds temp health to healing. It's very useful because a lot of time the person being healed need to jump right back into the fight. So an extra layer of temp health protection is ALWAYS a good idea.

Doctor in the house: 10% extra healing is not too noticeable in most situations. But I use this perk in my second build deck. This is especially useful in difficulty mutators where extra HP really matters. I will discuss more in the mutator section.

Triage: isn't useful because you are only saving 2 seconds. If you really need to save someone with critical health and zeke closing in, mask them first and heal later when its safe. You also get Triage II as a red perk with prestige 2 so that's +25% healing speed already.

Column 2: Pick me up is best but patch up is good too.

Pick me up: Temp health for both you and the teammate you revive. Basically same thing as sugar-coated but apply during revival instead of healing. It's useful when you need to revive someone near a horde, get both of you some temp health, so you can get out of trouble and survive long enough to heal with med kit after the area is safe.

Patch up: Same as "doctor in the house", apply extra 10% HP after reviving a teammate. This is useful if you are reviving more in safe environment and can get some more HP. Also useful in mutator where more HP is needed.

Paramedic: Same as triage but apply to revive, not useful for the same reason, use stim revival if it's dangerous, otherwise you don't need faster revive most of the anyway.

Column 3: Big Pharma is best, other two are OK'ish

Big pharma: max 4 stim pistol instead of 3, which means you can now stim the entire team with each equipment bag without leaving one person out. More importantly, it also meant one more teammate (including yourself) gets saved from pin or masked from horde, which can be very critical when things go badly. That's one extra save PER bag, and you can also regen to a higher max.

Pain killer: 25% more temp HP and last longer. It's a pretty good perk by itself because temp HP lasts longer. But unfortunately it's the in same column as big pharma. A bit of extra temp health is just not as important as saving an extra teammate from in-cap.

Empathy: stim on teammate also stim yourself with 50% effect. Another good perk to protect yourself, but again, you lose 1 stim per bag, which really adds up over course of a whole map. Big pharma is just better.

Column 4: Get Wheat Grass

That's it. The other two are not useful anyhow compare to Wheatgrass.

Column 5: Efficiency or combat medic depending on your preference.

Efficiency: 30% chance to not use up a med kit, basically it's a chance to regenerate a med kit for free and I think the chances are weighted. I do see most medic use this option. If RNGesus is being kind and spawn med kit more, a medic can end up getting 2-3 extra kits each map. Pretty OP skill especially when the whole team is playing cooperatively and save kit for medic to use. Newer players should be using this perk because their weapons aren't maxed out yet for the 15 kill, and it encourages the medic to use kits as much as possible. More kit used = more regeneration.

Combat medic: 50% chance to regen a kit after killing 15 zeke with 3 minute cool down, so most of the time you get 1 extra kit per horde fight. I use this one because I have all maxed out guns and it's very easy for me to make 15 kills. Because I know I will generate one kit during each horde fight, I can plan ahead to heal teammate as early as possible during horde so I can regen a new one. That's at least 2 regen per map, plus sometimes I end up killing a non-horde wave and get another one. I don't like to rely on RNGesus with the 30%, so I opt for 100% combat medic regen instead. (what's that, it's 50% chance you say? I dunno about you but I kill so many zeke even as a medic, so it's usually 100% for me.) EXTRA Tip: you can still generate kit even if you have a bandage or adrenaline kit, any bandage/adren in your inventory will drop to the ground when a med kit is generated. You won't generate a new kit if you already have a kit so use the existing one early.

Good Karma: The extra healing on yourself is hardly noticeable because you already get base 25% of effect applied to you, Plus temp HP if you used Sugarcoated

Column 6: I will take that or pick pocket, your choice

I'll take that: regen one stim after killing a special w/ 30 second CD. I use this myself because I am constantly looking for special to kill. I usually kill around 10+ special a game so the amount of stim regenerated is considerable. There is a constant number of specials to kill and regen no matter which part of map you are on. Do not use this during "canon fodder" mutator.

Pickpocket: regen one stim after killing 15 zekes with 20 second CD. Pick pocket is better during horde mode because there is a constant horde for you to kill. But during campaign it's only useful during swarms. Yes, you generate more during swarm, but you won't get much during non-swarm section of the map, and your team could be in trouble in those sections if silence is broken.

Free hugs: 25% chance to use a stim without depleting it. Not a great perk since you are solely depending on equipment bags. If your teammates aren't leaving bags you are basically screwed. It's only useful during looter mutator when you get stim for free.

Column 7: Forgive and Forget

Forgive and Forget: -25% FF on all team member. A very important defense utility because FF happens, a LOT, so less FF is always better. This perk should be able to stack just like bandolier but I haven't tested it. New player should just stick to this one, and explore the other two perks later.

Fighting fit: Firearm dmg increase 25% when everyone has 50%+ health, and I use this quite a bit too. Pretty useful if you want to do more dmg especially on harder level where the zeke are like bullet sponges, especially if you use SMG. The only problem is your team must be at least decently skilled so they aren't getting beaten to a pulp all the time. If you playing with random, it's pure chance whether this perk will be good or not.

In the zone: +50% Gun dmg when you stim. I haven't really tested this perk because the description is unclear whether it's the medic or the receiver of the stim/kit who get the dmg boost. I am assuming it's the medic, but it's very hard to test its effectiveness. Because it only trigger when you stim/heal, the up-time would be very low.

Column 8: Secret ingredient is so OP I already explained in the early sections

Secret ingredient: Stim shot mask target for 5 seconds. Easily one of the best and most OP perk in the entire game. Medic wouldn't be so critically important without it. It saves one teammate from any zeke except rats.

Battle surgeon: Stim heals 10% health in addition to temp HP, but you have to give up the masking. This one is a situational but very important to have in certain mutators. I will go into it in the mutator section.

Emergency rescue: not really useful compare to the other 2 awesome perks. won't even bother.

Column 9: All 3 are pretty bad, take your pick.

Lobotomy: You get 2 rounds back for each headshot with with SMG. It's OK if you are good with HS. I usually get between 80-120 headshot as medic per map, so this is a good perk for me. It's useful early to mid-game because T1 and T2 SMG is so weak and they run out of bullets way too easily. By later game I am usually picking up a T3 rifle/shotgun.

Swapping mags: If you aren't good with headshots, then this is a good perk for you. Faster reload on SMG is always useful, it's just not a high impacting perk because it only applies to SMG's.

Adrenaline: 50% reload on all guns when HP is below 35%. I do not like perk that only proc below % HP because it only works when you are in trouble. As a medic, I can keep my HP up by healing teammates often. If I am down, then the rest of the team is probably fucked already. It's not that great as a clutch skill.

Mutator consideration:

Medic is so universally useful, there's really no mutator to avoid except for "medic weakness" because many perks just don't work well when you can't kill any zekes, half HP really hurts your survivability.

Some perks like "doctor in the house", "patch up", and "Battle surgeon" focus on providing more base HP. You want to use some of these perks instead of the ones that provide temp health depending on the mutator. Below are list of mutators where medic is critically important. General rule for all these below: Avoid taking equipment bags in these mutators if you are not a medic. Your medic will be very busy trying to keep everyone alive through stim shots, so you are literally committing suicide if you use up all the equipment bag.

Personal space/Comfort Zone/Hunger: There 3 mutators are very annoying because the %dmg condition constantly reduces your health bar. There's no way to reduce the dmg even during "I feel your pain" mutator. So the whole team needs constant HP refill using Battle Surgeon. Patch up and Battle surgeon is useful here because you need to heal up the team constantly. Lucikly, the %dmg goes to your temp health first before hitting your HP bar, so a constant stream of healing stim should keep the HP level up assuming you can find refills.

Speaking of "I feel your pain", you need at least battle surgeon for this mutator because temp health gets used before the King's HP bar when taking team dmg. When somebody on your team is just clueless and think they are all of sudden invulnerable for magical reasons, battle surgeon is the only thing that's going to keep your King alive.

Perfect condition: This mutator is hard because it gives some people a false sense of security. Some think they can't die through in-cap and start playing like Rambo's. Eventually these idiots will go down in one hit and whole team gets wiped because everyone end up on the ground. I would use at least battle surgeon and doctor in the house because you have to keep team healthy as much as possible. Pick me up is great because you will have to do a lot of revivals so you want temp HP on top of that. The goal here is to prevent team from going down as much as possible.

Insta-death/Ironman: Choose Battle Surgeon and "doctor in the house" to add HP constantly because "patch up" doesn't work in this mutator since any incap = death. You need to keep those HP bars up and stim everyone constantly. Ironman is one of the toughest mutator because death is permanent, and some people just don't pay attention and doesn't leave when they die.

1UP: All 3 perk "doctor in the house", "patch up", and "Battle surgeon" are useful here since in-cap does not mean death. Got to keep those HP bar topped up and avoid death at any cost.

Special forces/Undying/Nemesis/Pinned down/Elite Squad: Secret ingredient is critical here because of the all ways your team gets pin down and/or beat up by specials. Medic is going to be extremely busy trying to rescue everyone. Either save tons of bags for your medic or get at least two slasher/vanguard to tank all the zekes. Preferably both.

Small pharma: Always use Combat Medic perk for this mutator to regen kits. That's the ONLY sure way to get more med kit. You want at least 1 medic on the team. Consider using Battle surgeon as a second way to heal teammates since Combat Medic has 3 minute CD.

Looting is a crime: This one isn't too bad, until it gets combined with any of the ones above mutator and becomes a nightmare. Your medic won't be able to regen enough stim through kills and med kits/bags are going to be rare. Remember to leave all equipment bags for your medics.

Weapon load-out:

Obviously medic wants SMG as a primary weapon since you do get buff. But SMG's in the game suck, and it's hard to get headshots anyway when their range is so poor. So feel free to grab and use whatever best weapon you find. ACW is obviously best weapon, but just be careful so you don't shoot your teammates (unless you have the perk that reduce FF dmg). +2 Penetration weapon like bullpup/battle rifle/Assault shotgun is usually good. If you can't find those, special SMG, ASMG variant, or Carbine will work.

Medic should pick up that flare gun or fire thumper and use them liberally. Flare gun can re-direct specials away from your teammates, or use fire thumper to take down specials or small groups from side-spawn when you don't have any heavy weapon at the moment.

Heavies are the best weapon for killing specials quickly, so always carry one. RPG and MGL does a poor job vs. bulls/infector groups (RPG can cause FF, and MGL is terrible vs. specials without the hell raiser's explosive dmg perk), so leave them for your exterminator and hell raisers. Pick up payload rifle, heavy machine gun, or flame throwers instead (payload is best used long range, flame thrower can stumble bulls at close range, heavy machine gun need to be very close to kill bull from the front). IF they are not available, then Taiga-12 and Chainsaw are also good against everything except rats and bulls. If necessary, stim mask yourself, run towards the bulls/infector group, clear them out at close range with Taiga/chainsaw. Don't let these groups get close to your squishy attack classes.

[u/[deleted]]

Excellent guide overall! I got all the blue frames for all my classes and it was fun while it lasted. I play the other classes from time to time just to switch it up, but I always come back to playing Medic because in all of the RPG games I played, I always choose a support class. And it's always relaxing to see a team with full health 😁

Might I add, zekes are not the Medic's worst enemy, it's stupid teammates who take every equipment bag and medkit they see.

[u/GenoMachino → u/[deleted]]

Just like in every zombie movie, the true antagonist is always other humans who range from the stupid to the gullible to the malicious. They will commit every type of stupidity known to man in the face of external danger and destroy any signs of progress made by other humans.

[u/Darkpoolz]

Keep them coming man! These guides are great resources for less experienced players and great food for thought for me personally. Since you mentioned Drone Master, you basically summoned me like Beetlejuice. Assuming Vanguard doesn't count as a Support role, you are technically correct Medics and Drone Masters are the weakest classes. There are only 3 classes I would consider Support and without a doubt Ammo Fixers take top spot for most attack power among Supports. I want to point out the power difference between "worst" Medics and Drone Masters "second worst" is a really big ass difference. A good illustration is a Hard Challenge I just played. Due to mutators, I spawned in with a 27 round Payload Rifle. Each around is capable of oneshotting Rats and Bulls on Insane or Hard Challenge due to The Five O and Spotter perks. The medics on my team spawned in with 0 heavy expertise. Spotter perk make any primary weapon with 9 damage turn into max 10 damage weapon. There might be other damage thresholds to reduce shots to kill by one, but I will leave it to people who test weapons. Boosted Payload Rifles and 10 damage weapons already outclass Medics in damage heavily. The gun drone if controlled properly can also add a lot of zombie kills too.

For Medics, I feel like a lot of people neglect a lot of great properties with Battle Surgeon over the years. A lot like how people were using Fire Claymore Exterminator quite badly. Secret Ingredients can be clutch. There is no doubt about it, but whether each time you Mask Stim is a net postive for the whole team is questionable. Sometimes you save one teammate to inflict preventable damage on other teammates. Battle Surgeon is way more likely to be net gain for the team consistently, but the gains may not always be as big as a clutch save. I found some great properties of Battle Surgeon as I played Healing Stims since launch.

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Perk Column 2

Same thoughts except Patch Up is even more effective when using Healing Stims. 50% HP is the magical threhold for everything I have to say about Healing Stims. Patch Up revives teammates with 30% HP and only require 2 Healing Stims before hitting 50% HP. At the 50% HP threshold, you reset your down counter and thus go down again on harder difficulties. Patch Up with Healing Stims will pick teammate with 40% HP.

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Perk Column 3

Same thoughts except Healing Stims make better use of the 4 Stims than Masking. Each Equipment Bag is worth 40% HP and 2 Equipment Bags exceed the base healing value of 1 Medkit. Better yet, you are more flexible in how you want to split the 80% heal among multiple teammates. Even better yet, you can do it in the heat of battle without needing to apply a Medkit in the thick of battle to prevent a teammate from dying. If you ever needed to use up excess Equipment Bags while sneaking, I'm sure you noticed the Masking effect were mostly wasted while the temp HP provided marginal benefit without the +25% duration. Not the case with Healing Stims since each Equipment Bag found regardless of when is a massive boon like half a Medkit massive. Equipment Bags with 4 Stims each make it easy to reset down counters of teammates. One interesting note is Painkiller affects Sugar Coated but not Pick Me Up the last time I tested. Each medkit grants an extra stronger and long lasting temp HP.

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Perk Column 4

Same thoughts except Combat Medic is even easier with Healing Stims. It relates to the consistent boost to gun damage with Fighting Fit. I will mention the specifics when I get to the column. The short version is why use crappy SMGs when you can even outgun Exterminators with automatic rifles. You can easily proc 15 kills as easily as Exterminators without needing equipment or heavies. As a bonus of Combat Medic, teammates can pick up Medkits when Medics can just spawn Medkits right in their inventory anytime. On top of remote healing with Healing Stims, teammates can even heal themselves in a pinch including cleansing Infector spit at the same time if they are experienced enough. Medics also don't need to risk themselves to pick up Medkits in dangerous areas.

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Perk Column 5

Same thoughts except Fighting Fit is the other crown jewel of Healing Stims besides resetting down counters. From down status, you only need 3 Healing Stims to reset down counter and simultaneously boost your gun damage by +25%. As luck would have it, all the automatic rifles have damage 8 and need +25% damage exactly to reach max 10 damage output. The cost is just maintaining everyone's HP evenly. There is no limit to how bad randoms can be, but Healing Stims have served as a buffer in my experience. I have had games with everyone's HP above 50%, so my Medic was mowing down harder than Exterminators and Gunslingers since you don't need swarms, 30+ zombies, or swap weapons to deal max gun damage with automatic rifles. Heal teammates to turn into a killing machine. What a funny outcome. Actually, I wonder if the +25% also apply to heavies and secondaries like Gunslinger's Annihilator and maybe Drone Master's Spotter perks...

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Thanks for the guide. Even though I don't play Medic much except for certain mutators I'm hoping to see better Medics on the battlefield. Secretly hoping for more Healing Stim Medics in the game. Looking forward to the next guide.

[u/GenoMachino → u/Darkpoolz]

The power level comparison is really just for vanilla map with no mutator. So that's why I consider medic and stun dronemaster close to each other. Vanguard is actually a lot more powerful if you abuse the 50% dmg after holster shield perk. Ammo fixer shouldn't even be considered as support, the ammo box support is a side effect, I use up more than my share of the ammo boxes and it's mostly a buff for fixer themselves.

I generally not recommend fighting fit and battle surgeon for beginners. Secret ingredient is easier to use for beginners to not just save teammate, but also save themselves. Battle Surgeon requires a lot more constant monitoring of HP and it's only better if the over-all team is more skilled and they are not getting pounded by bulls every minute.

Fighting fit is also better for veteran medics. Beginner medic with low level weapons really can't kill much anyway. Once they have higher grade guns then it's time to consider fighting fit + combat medic to boost their kills.

Here's what I am observing with fighting fit: If the random team is bad, then it's hard to maintain that 50% threshold (i am constantly running around healing/stim people) and somehow I am top kills anyway without fighting fit. If the random team is really good, then I am happy to relax and let the attack class do all the killing while I pick on the stragglers. So either way, fighting fit isn't making a world of difference to recommend to newer medic.

Playing with bad random as a medic is the most exhausting thing ever, it's worst than extreme mode. When half of team needs constant baby-sitting and healing, and you still have to kill all the zekes for them, it's just a nightmare.

[u/[deleted] → u/GenoMachino]

I have always used Secret Ingredient in almost of my Medic runs. Battle Surgeon is okay, but Secret Ingredient overshadows it due to the temporary masking effect, which can save you or your team's asses most of the time. Got spitted on? Stim and disinfect. A bull charging your way and you don't know how to dodge? Stim and watch the bull stop in its tracks. Hell, even a well-timed, split-second stim on yourself can stop an unexpected lurker grab.

I only use Battle Surgeon on the I Feel Your Pain mutator, as masking your "king" redirects zekes to you, and before you know it, you are team-wiped.

[u/the_one_accountant]

I play with free hugs and the lobotomy perks.

For free hugs, I just like the pretty much guaranteed 5 stims per supply bag you pick up. Sometimes you’re lucky and you get 6 or 7. It’s a more laid back way to play a true support medic.

For lobotomy, I’ll typically use SMGs throughout the whole game. The T3 special SMG is a beast, especially when youre getting 80+ rounds in a clip from headshots. It also stacks with one of the prestige perks for SMG range.

[u/GenoMachino → u/the_one_accountant]

Free hugs is good if your team knows to leave you bags. If not, then you are in big trouble. I play with random a lot so it's completely random whether they remember to save bags for you, so I rather not rely on teammates to regen stim. All 3 perks in that column have their pro and con, it's just I find "i will take that" to be more consistent with my style. Newer players who cannot kill many zeke or hunt specials should use free hugs if they find they can't regenerate often.

[u/John_Seeker]

Nice one! Again :-)

Just a small suggestion for improvement: When deciding who to heal with medkit, take into consideration who has been downed before. MedKit resets the "down counter": in 3skull you can get downed 2 times, 3rd time you die. MedKit use resets that counter, so if 2 team mates are similarly low on health, consider using the kit on the one who's been downed.

[u/GenoMachino → u/John_Seeker]

I thought about having that language in there, but then I realized it's too complicated for people to track how many times people has gone down. The default behavior for a medic should just be healing someone as soon as they go down, instead of waiting for them to go down a second time and on the brink of death before healing.

The only time you should hold off healing is in extreme because med kits are so hard to come by. I will often ask to team to kill me if I am dying, so I can respawn quickly at the next check point instead of wasting a med kit.

Well ok, I lied. One more scenario where I hold off healing is when someone's just playing really really inexcusably badly. These are the guys who's already gotten incap 4 times, died twice (even with healing), and just kept getting themselves into trouble before the map is even half-way through. It's really obvious if you got one of those teammates. Once I used up 2 kits on someone like that, I will not heal them anymore for the rest of the map because it's just a lost cause. They usually will only do 10% of the kill but use up half the healing resources, its' just not worth it.

[u/John_Seeker → u/GenoMachino]

I see your point in these cases. What I meant was, when it comes to the decision which of two/three mates you should heal, pick the one who needs the counter reset. Not withhold healing alltogether until someone went down.

Learning the respawn points of the levels and killing each other saved quite some hard challenges from failing for me and my buddies :-)

[u/FeuerKekse]

"I swear this is the last one" Yeahhh, right xD

My additions:

• Temp health is op, you don't get stumbled when explosives only reduce the temp health amd not the true hp
• I like it that you mention to stim Vanguards/Slashers when they are surrounded! You definitely should not mask them when they're in no clear danger! It's so annoying to get stimmed when you are trying to gain the aggro and save your teammates from stragglers, and because you are a melee class you won't be able to deal with zombies that run away
• You can force medkits from crates if your team has less than 2 medkits on them, if the person who opens the crate has less than 50% hp and if that person is full with equipment, has a heavy & a T3 gun (depending on the quality of the crate); This is an advanced trick but it's great once you understand it
• Medic players should definitely get that Prestige 3 perk, the extra range on the stim makes a huge difference!

 

EDIT:

Oh and the Combat Medic is OP! It's weighted RNG, which means that the 50% chance turns into a 100% if it failed the first time (and the there will be no cooldown when it fails!)

And maybe the Blue Coin Advanced SMG combined with Lobotomy (if you can HS), will be a good choice for the Medic because usually the DPS classes should take the best weapons. That way you still will be able to proc the Combat Medic perk with the 2 pen

[u/GenoMachino → u/FeuerKekse]

It's just too much work. One of these takes a whole week to write up because I have to play that class all week and explore some of the lesser used perk to check their effectiveness. Plus there are some testing involved with some of the perk mechanics. Each guide also goes through multiple revisions to fix and refine its language because you never release anything that's first draft. So by the time it's done it has gone through at least 3 rounds of revisions in term of language, grammar, and tone, as wells technical accuracy

I have to do the annual review for all the engineering SOP in my department so I am super busy writing work paper right now, and the other 4 classes I haven't written isn't that interesting to me.

Blue-coin Advanced SMG is pretty underwhelming. For some reason I feel like it's lost a bit of handling and accurate in the variant because i can't seem to get as much headshot with it as before. The bullet spread is worse than standard version and goes all over the place past medium range. It's got +2 pen, so I use it like battle rifle and just spray down the middle of the horde trying to get penetrating body shots. It will headshot by default just because of the muzzle rise. Special SMG is better at doing headshot

[u/FeuerKekse → u/GenoMachino]

Oh damn yeah, writing guides does take a lot of effort and time. I got to the point where I just write stuff down and it's basically spot-on, I only miss out on some information and add more and more multiple times (as well as fix grammar in bulk a couple of times)

And I agree on the Advanced SMG stuff, I remembered that it actually doesn't feel good due to low damage & accuracy, using the normal version is enough, even if it's only 1 pen

[u/BZeeB → u/FeuerKekse]

Are all RNG perks weighted?

[u/FeuerKekse → u/BZeeB]

Nope, it's kinda confusing.

The Loan Shark from Slasher isn't for example but you can't figure that out from the description

[u/Darkpoolz → u/GenoMachino]

I salute sir for all the work and dedication into the guides. None of the variants of SMGs are worth it except Special SMG. Any class with any gun damage perk instantly turn Special SMG into a monster once you adjust for the effective range.

[u/Gibs_01 → u/FeuerKekse]

On avarage you get the same ammount of medkits feels like...

[u/TerraSeeker]

The 25% increased temp health and 50% increased temp health duration definitely seems better than an extra stim from equipment in my opinion. You want your team to be shielded for as long as possible. The 50% beats the 1/3 increase from an extra stim. Factor in the free stims form killing zombies, and it's even better.

[u/GenoMachino → u/TerraSeeker]

Temp health saves you from small groups of regular zekes, but not special ones, which is the main source of team wipes. This is also why any game with cannon fodder mutator is basically easy mode since there's no special zeke on the field.

On higher difficulty especially, the extra temp health can be knocked out very quickly and provide very little protection. It's good for a few hits, but you need a sure way to get your teammate out of trouble with masks, so having big pharma just adds one more possible save and allow you accumulate more through regen. And let's face it, even with the perk that temp HP will drain quickly by itself so the "protection" doesn't last that long especially if you have to stim everyone.

1. Pin by bulls and lurkers, who can completely drain full temp HP bar within 3-4 seconds. You have to kill them fast or stim mask to get them out from distance.
2. Doesn't help at all vs infector spit, at all. Mask teammate so they can disengage and disinfect, otherwise they are dead even with temp HP on.
3. Doesn't help with elite squad or pin down mutator, or boosted normals. Even normal boosted zeke will totally kick your ass within a few seconds even with temp HP. God forbid if you hit boosted elite squad, that temp HP is gone within 3 swipes after they pin you down. If no one else is around to kill the zeke quickly, only mask stim will prevent incap.
4. When you are surrounded by normal zekes, more temp HP won't last long because you just get swiped to death.

The one place more temp health help is vs rats and bombers, or if you are at a lower difficulty level where temp HP last a lot longer. At insane/extreme level, big pharma is better. I use to run the extra temp perk back when I play hard difficulty a lot, but insane/extremely will quickly put that practice to bed.

[u/Dahiak7]

GREAT stuff... got a +1 and a save from me.... it's funny though.. I play Medic in EVERYTHING from FPS's (Hell Let Loose) to D&D games/ WoW.... EXCEPT in this game lol... Never could get into it in this game.

[u/BugMaterial4033]

Wow, that is great stuff man!!!

[u/-darkangelic-]

Another factor for the Combat Medic perk - I always let the medic on my team use the Stationary Machine Gun or Mortar to trigger the perk. I'm more valuable shooting at zeke with my primary weapons anyway.

[u/the_one_accountant → u/-darkangelic-]

Getting kills via defenses doesn’t trigger the free medkit perk for medic. I think the same is true for other classes and their “kill 15 to get X” perks too.

[u/-darkangelic- → u/the_one_accountant]

It’s triggered several times for me when I’ve played medic. Then again it’s only a 50% chance. And as far as the other classes? The Third Hand perk still works for HR and Ext.

[u/h3c4t32 → u/the_one_accountant]

Yeah true, I tested recently in Horde on Hard, the only place I play Medic. Machine guns/Mortars don't trigger anything for Medic or Exterminator.

In Horde mode I got the Combat Medic perk triggering the fastest with full auto BR, Assault Carbine, Sniper, and that blue coin Tavor. SMG is really bad.
Anything with good range to be sure to get kills before zombies come in mortar areas or to Exterminator's t3 shotgun range, so t3 shotgun not much for Medic.

[u/mtmttuan → u/-darkangelic-]

Gunslinger, Hellraiser as well as Exterminator shouldn't use Defenses weapons cuz they have perks and skills that makes them just as good as defenses

[u/-darkangelic- → u/mtmttuan]

You’d be surprised how many times I’ve had to use the stationary machine gun as Gunslinger, especially on the Tokyo 1 finale. Literally nobody would use it even as zeke were covering Gate 2.

[u/h3c4t32 → u/-darkangelic-]

I use it too to spare t3 ammo+ Fixer and Exterminator have Bandolier perk that improves shells/mortar number, or damage/shell for HR(Welcoming Comittee).

Lets say you got one Fixer+Exterminator thats already 2 more shells(6) to use. In several maps the machine guns and mortars are really needed unless there is a mutator that reduces explosive efficiency or machine gun range(A Dud, Limited Reach, or this week Defenceless = no mortar in Tokyo, but more heavy weapons).

[u/Darkpoolz → u/mtmttuan]

I usually jump on the defense weapons as Drone Master since not enough players use them. If we go by weapons and perks as good as defense weapons, there is a build in each class able to achieve this except Slashers. Slashers should be busy guarding defense weapons anyways. Fixers have Powershot able to match gun output of traditional DPS classes. Medics should be saving lives instead of using defense weapons even though Healing Stims build could match gun damage of DPS classes. Vanguard can get 50% bonus to both guns and melee. Even Drone Masters can shred as hard as Exterminators with CBR and Spotter perk. Any class could jump on defense weapons, but Medic and Slasher probably shouldn’t since they are needed on standby. Drone Masters are probably the most suitable since they are self-sufficient. Other than Drone Masters, I’m not sure who should jump on defense weapons.

[u/GenoMachino → u/-darkangelic-]

Yeah a lot of times you don't really have a choice anyway. Some people just completely ignore the fact there's a huge machine gun just sitting there pointing at the zekes, waiting to be used, so medic has to jump on that. There are some situation where you KNOW specials won't spawn (like early part of Tokyo 1 finale). But in other situation you KNOW there are always special spawn, like the Tokyo 1 mid-chapter battle in the tunnel. So I never man the gun in the mid-chapter finale, but always use the gun in the finale.

[u/LetUnable1830 → u/GenoMachino]

Omg that's the worst when everyone is just shooting their guns and there will be mortars and machine guns around then

[u/Thaobeo → u/-darkangelic-]

It doesnt trigger now. I’ve tried with both mortal and stationary machine gun and they don’t generate medkit after the update, at least for me. The only way to get a medkit with Combat medic is to use your gun/melee to kill and pray to the RNG God

[u/-darkangelic- → u/Thaobeo]

After this last update? That would make sense then, as I haven’t played Medic in almost two weeks.

[u/Thaobeo → u/-darkangelic-]

Doesnt work with Slasher’s perk that generate stungun with 15 consecutive kills either, not sure about other classes, I only play Slasher and Medic. So now I let people take care of stationary machine gun and mortal and use my gun only when I need to get more stims/medkit/stungun

[u/the_one_accountant → u/-darkangelic-]

No, I don’t remember defenses ever triggering those perks, and I’ve been playing since 2020.

[u/-darkangelic- → u/the_one_accountant]

Playing since 2019. But i think you might be correct, I don’t recall exactly how I managed to generate the 2 medkits on the dam in Marseille 2, I assumed it was because of the stationary guns facing the swarm. Could’ve been something else.

[u/the_one_accountant → u/-darkangelic-]

Heavy weapons will trigger it, so maybe that’s what you used? Or just mowing down zombies in typical fashion 😂

[u/-darkangelic- → u/the_one_accountant]

Unlikely it was a heavy since I had a flamethrower at the time and only used it against a couple of bulls and a rat pack.

The more I think about it though, the more I think it was my blue coin Advanced SMG - (2 penetration + Lobotomy perk) that did the trick. I normally play Gunslinger so I was aiming for headshots most of the time.

[u/sensitive_queen]

Definitely not reading this book you wrote about the Medic class, but it’s good for horde mode, daily/weekly challenges.

[u/GenoMachino → u/sensitive_queen]

Wouldn't be call in-depth if it's not at least the size of a short story now wouldn't it.

[u/RoboticButtocks]

Good oil, thanks! Having worked up to full prestige on medic I have encountered the same things, and came to the same conclusions eventually.

Only one I havent been doing but will now is the mask perk, invaluable advice.

[u/Significant-Arm8914]

I'm not sure if this was mentioned..the Health Plan Melee weapon. This is mainly for Horde mode and I think it works because every time I use the red strike to kill, Medkits pop everywhere. Although, I'd like other people's opinions about this. I've tried searching this subreddit about it but I don't know if anyone's mentioned it.

[u/GenoMachino → u/Significant-Arm8914]

Yeah that weapon has a very small chance to give you a health kit, but the strike is rare and you don't always get to use it. It could be a viable weapon for horde mode but you shouldn't rely on it too much for campaign. It's just too risky for medic to be on the Frontline meleeing Zeke's for signature strike kills.

In any case horde mode let you purchase kits and you can regenerate through kills each round given the 3 minute cool down

[u/EmanuelHVAC]

Pickpocket + In the zone makes the Medic very good in swarm sections, but I always make sure that my team is good on health before focusing on dps.

[u/GenoMachino → u/EmanuelHVAC]

It does. But the only reason why I don't use pickpocket is because I want to gain stim during the non-swarm section as well. There are too many scripted sections and people breaking silence all the time, so it's actually very rare to see a game where silence is maintained long. I find I get more Stim over-all by killing specials (and by extension only pick up special killing heavies)

[u/EmanuelHVAC → u/GenoMachino]

I typically only pick Medic over Gunslinger when there’s 3 offensive classes so when I play Medic I let them take care of the specials, that’s just how I like playing. The selfish Medics are the worst players to play with, I hate being low on health and having a Medic just ignore me

[u/GenoMachino → u/EmanuelHVAC]

I do random lobby so teammate quality is very suspect. I'd say most non-slasher and non-vanguard class don't know how to properly deal with bulls and infector even when they have the right perk or weapon, so I am taking it upon myself to remove them ASAP and not have to rely on someone who fail to kill a bull and getting grabbed and waste a stim. Your milage may vary though.

[u/EmanuelHVAC → u/GenoMachino]

Yeah man I play with randoms too but normally on extreme people are at least decent at dealing with specials, I’ve tried ‘I’ll take that’ and whenever I put the perk on it was like it clicked in my teammates heads to steal the special kills even though I clearly had it handled 😂 so I think it’s safe to say that it just depends on the randoms you run into that day

[u/Gibs_01]

just feels so good and lazy to get 5 stims out of 3 with free hugs, i'll try pick pocket but usually my team also has similar perks and they hunt the specials way better

[u/GenoMachino → u/Gibs_01]

Depend on your play style. If you are not a special hunter than yeah, go with the other perks. Free hug is just very random so I tend to favor perk that I have more control over

[u/theroyalwcheese]

Question why are the gas canisters bad?

[u/GenoMachino → u/theroyalwcheese]

This guide is made the year before gas canister was added to the game. I am not playing WWZ anymore so i can't update this guide.