I want to point how this guide is supposed to explain MvM's toxicty, not agreeing with it or even justifying it. Explaining why something bad exist does not mean in any way that you agree with this thing or are part of the category of people aimed by this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ooOELrGMn14

Certainly the one most people know about and have at least experienced once in their life if they played the most played tour : Two Cities.

The reason so many people play Two Cities is because the loot you get from this tour is more interesting. Other tours gives botkillers and, at best, Australiums, while Two Cities also gives Australiums but also robot parts and killstreak kits.

In the early days of Two Cities, people went for what is now called the "Two Cities meta" (TC Meta), where the team is composed of a Scout, Soldier, Demoman, Heavy, Engineer and Medic. The reason why this team composition is the meta is NOT because it's the best team composition, but because it worked and TC players don't want to reinvent the wheel. Pyro, Sniper and Spy are not bad classes to pick, but tend to be misunderstood.

The toxicity arrives when one of those non-meta classes is picked (it's a bit different for Pyro, but I will speak about it later). It is mostly due to the TC meta worshippers thinking only this team composition works, but also because they simply don't know how these 3 classes are supposed to be played. It's not uncommon to see people thinking Spy is about using his sapper and must use the Kunai (special thanks to Skymin for spreading that misinformation), or Sniper being about single-target damage and needing God-like aim.

When these players go outside of Two Cities, they want to enforce the TC meta (despite this team composition having the tendency to fail in missions where Tanks are a threat, like in Mecha Engine or Gear Grinder), since they do not know how to play with any other team composition.

This is mostly due to this kind of players that you can hear "we need a medic" in a Medic-less team, despite the class NOT being needed in any case, due to the various healing sources, two even coming from upgrades, and Ubers can be replaced by canteens (and since canteens themselves aren't needed to beat any mission, so does Ubers). I am not saying that Medic is useless, but when people pick Medic over Engineer, the only needed class due to his dispenser being the only reliable source of ammo, there is a problem.

And when the team composition is not the TC meta, or the team fails a wave and there is a player that does not have a class part of the TC meta, the non-meta player(s) are pointed at and blamed for any wrong-doing that might have happened at any time during the game.

Overall, due to people limiting their knowledge to the Two Cities meta, they become toxic wanting to enforce it.

The Gas Passer is a secondary for the Pyro that was added during the Jungle Inferno update and have an MvM-specific upgrade called Explosion on Ignite. The upgrade itself makes any robot covered in the Gas Passer's gas deal 350 damage to itself and robots around him when hit by any damage source. The upgrade itself cost 400$.

To understand the toxicity coming from this, we need to look at Pyro before the Jungle Inferno update.
Pyro was, and still is, an incredible damage dealer in MvM and one the best classes to deal with Tanks, being able to destroy them by itself on most if not all missions. Against robots, he is incredible at close range, but had to study bot aggro to flank them or outdamage them before he is killed and rely on Health on kill upgrades. Due to airblast (and any form of knockback in MvM overall) being a tool only used for extreme situations, or most of the time useless, Pyro players preferred to use the Phlog to maximize their damage output. Pyro is also the cheapest class in MvM to upgrade thanks to only needing damage and ammo upgrades on the Flamethrower, assuming the player using the class know how to use it optimally. Pyro could also help with money collection due to him fighting at close range most of the time.
The main weaknesses of Pyro at the time were long range fighting, dealing with Uber Medics (like most classes), where all he can do is airblast them, and, debatably, ammo dependency.

When the Gas Passer was added, it removed all the weaknesses Pyro had and damaged the position Demoman and Sniper had in the meta (the MvM meta, not the TC meta), since Pyro can now kill Uber Medics reliably (yes, even with the cooldown on the Gas Passer), using a non-expensive upgrade and with minimal skill required. When Demoman and Sniper are also considered powerful classes in MvM, and they can now be replaced easily by a 400$ upgrade, there is a balance problem. On top of that, Explosion on Ignite deals a massive amount of damage for low risks and with a low skill floor (and low skill ceiling).

Some players did not like how the Gas Passer increased the Pyro's overall power and shaked the meta with low skill required. It got worse for them, as other, less MvM-invested players welcomed the change, thinking that having Pyro become stronger was a good thing, even saying that the Gas Passer made Pyro viable (when he already was more than viable). The power increase the Pyro got from this weapon is so great, that some players refuse to see a Pyro not using the Gas Passer.

The clash of these two point of views causes a lot of drama in the MvM community, bringing toxicity with it. On one side, you have players that refuses to let Pyros use the Gas Passer, while on the other, any Pyro should be using the Gas Passer. Anyone in the crossfire simply cannot play Pyro without doing a gamble, as you might face an anti-Gas when you are using it, and a pro-Gas when you aren't.

I don't know if Elitist is the best word to define these players, but there is a category that knows MvM really well. They are among the best MvM players and if they tell you that you are doing something wrong, they are certainly right.

However, they don't always speak about your mistakes in the nicest of ways. It's mostly due to them being alienated by the average TF2 playerbase having a LOT of misconceptions regarding MvM and its balance, with some even trying to go AGAINST the TC meta or its main components (Medic tends to be the main target). In a way, regarding toxicity, only these people are actually part of the core MvM community.

It gets even worse as they tend to consider many things in MvM as common knowledge, and everyone not knowing some of what they consider basics are victim of their toxicity, or use their knowledge of the gamemode to be as toxic as possible, up to the point of kicking a player before the last wave on purpose, because he "wasn't worth getting the mission done".

They reached a point where they get alienated by TF2 players that speaks about the common misunderstanding of the gamemode (such as how the Two Cities meta is the only way to play, or the Gas Passer being a good thing for the gamemode), which is certainly the main contributor to their toxicity.

Their toxicity is certainly the worst anyone can face when playing Mann Up. It has gone up to a point that they created "kicklists" and bots to warn these players when they play with someone on the kicklist, so that they can vote that player out.

It's true that many players comes to MvM on the hardest difficulties not knowing anything about the gamemode is a problem, but the methods and toxicity used are certainly not the best way to solve this.

Speaking of players that don't know about the gamemode...

This is extremely common in MvM but rarely spoken about outside of the various MvM communities. New player themselves tends to be toxic toward other players (and even other new players themselves).

It's true that they are also the main victims of other forms of toxicity, which can explain why they are trying to defend themselves by being toxic. It's human behavior after all. But sadly, being toxic to toxic people still makes you toxic.

In itself, going to Advanced or Expert, the two hardest difficulties of the game, when you have no to low experience with the gamemode is not something anyone should be doing (despite MvM being known to be "easy").

Some of you might say "Well good players should teach them then", which is an legitimate answer, but these good players tends to meet multiple new players per mission, and teaching each player what they should do takes a lot of time. You cannot ask anyone to waste 20 to 30 minutes per mission to teach every new players they meet how MvM works. And this is assuming the player teaching others knows how the gamemode works. It's true that, on Mann Up, these new players spent money to play like anyone else, but so do these good players. Why should they spend their time teaching new players the game instead of playing themselves ? Especially on Advanced and Expert, where new player are not really supposed to be. Why should they spend their playtime carrying others that are not fit for the difficulty in the first place ?

And this is assuming these new players are willing to learn. Reality is, when someone try to help a new player, he will answer "Don't tell me what to do", "I know what I'm doing" or "Let me play how I want". And those are the situations where language barrier is not an issue. Few are the new players that want to listen to others in-game. How do you want to teach something to someone that doesn't want to learn or simply cannot learn ?

Some of you might answer "Let them try, they might be better than you think". But reality is, it's really easy to know who is good or bad even before the first wave starts, simply by looking at class selection, loadout and upgrades (and no, what is good is not restricted to the Two Cities meta).

In short : you have a lot of new players that join higher difficulties without the proper experience in MvM, refuse to listen to others, and become toxic due to other players kicking them.

This is more of a theory some MvM players have rather than an actual category of toxicity. Something some of you might think "Why do MvM players care so much about balance ? Isn't MvM about destroying armies of robots with upgrades making you godlike ?"

This is a mentality that is rarely seen in other PvE games. If you said that "Balance doesn't matter since you are fighting bots" in any other PvE-focused game, 99% of the players will disagree with you. The main reason why is because challenge matters. If the game was truly about wiping hordes of enemies without efforts, there would be no reason to go above the lowest difficulty, nor there would be a reason to make any higher difficulty for that matter.

Let's take Left 4 Dead for example. It's a game about mowing down zombies, but you still have things to take care of like special infected, know when to use medkits and pills, manage ammo and prefer sidearms in certain situations, etc... And there is a dedicated playerbase that prefers playing on Advanced and Expert, where challenge is most present.

This is similar to what we have in MvM. Players tend to prefer playing on Advanced and Expert missions, since Normal and Intermediate tends to be more learning grounds that doesn't offer a lot of challenge.

However, some players don't have this mentality in MvM, saying that the easiest you can win, the better. They are more about the destination than the travel. This might be due to TF2 being also a PvP game. MvM is given access to players that are more focused on PvP games.

This clash is one of the roots of toxicity in MvM. You have players that wants to win and go the shortest and easiest path all the time, while others want to play for the challenge and cooperation the gamemode offers. This is also why the Gas Passer is a problem to many.

I want to point out something that is important, because it's a common misunderstanding.

At no point did I speak about Tours!

This is because Tours are a bad metric. Just like how someone with high Tour doesn't mean it's a good player, a high Tour isn't necessarily a toxic player. Or how someone with low Tours isn't a bad player, it doesn't mean he's not toxic. And vice-versa.

People associating... anything with tours is a bad habit that too many players took. People say that Free To Play players are bad, but everyone knows that being Free To Play doesn't make you bad (nor not being Free To Play makes you good). This is the same thing with Tours.

I also want to point out that a person being toxic in one category doesn't stop them from being toxic in another. It's not uncommon to see Elitists being anti-Gas or new players forcing the Two Cities meta on others, even on more experienced players (too many times I heard new players telling me to not be Sniper/Spy...).

And finally, I want to point that I do not speak about people playing mainly for loot as being toxic. This is because these type of players doesn't really exist. As the years went by, players realized you can't make profits from Mann Up. Loot became more of a little bonus rather than the main reason to play Mann Up. Only new players tend to come with the hope of getting this sweet Australium. Rare are the players that spend hundreds, if not thousands, of tours in hope of making a profit. Nowadays, players are on Mann Up to get more serious groups that wants to win, since Bootcamp tends to be populated with players that do not even want to play the game, or to simply flex their tour count on other MvM players.

As a playerbase, it's true some efforts could be done. New players could check guides or stay in lower difficulties until they are better, while listening to more experienced players. Elitists could be more accepting of new players and help them with the basics of the game. Two Cities worshippers could open their minds and see how the non-meta classes are supposed to do.

But in reality, there is one to blame before any other : Valve.

Before I continue because someone pointed it out, I'm not saying the community is not at fault or that their toxicity is nothing important due to Valve. These players are still at fault and should reap what they sow, but Valve let it happen.

Valve did not put any measures excepted votekick to deal with toxic players. Valve did not encourage to try various team compositions instead of keeping to one. Valve did not put any proper balance patch since the Two Cities update. Valve let the Gas Passer be a serious balance issue for nearly 3 years now with no effort trying to fix it. Finally, Valve put no proper barrier to ensure new players at least knows the basics of the gamemode before letting them go to higher difficulties and Mann Up.

It got even worse, as Valve removed matchmaking bans from Mann Up, allowing players to leave before the first wave starts without any penality, and broke the 15 minutes ban after a player is kicked, forcing the kicked player to come back to the server they were kicked from.

If Valve put efforts in the gamemode and ensuring the toxicity was kept to a minimum, the toxicity issues MvM have would have been more of a detail rather than the main reason many do no play the gamemode at all !

If anyone from Valve or the TFTeam is reading this : I understand MvM, and even TF2, is not the priority right now, but please do something against the toxicity in MvM.

Thank you for taking the time to read this "guide". I understand I might have missed some points, but don't hesitate to comment so I can extend this guide to answer any question about toxicity in MvM.

More guides :
https://steamproxy-script.pipiskins.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=461752155
https://steamproxy-script.pipiskins.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1747841601
https://steamproxy-script.pipiskins.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1274215055