Captain Peak wrote:Is a shotgun or a flare gun better for the pyro?
Detonator in my opinion.
Shotgun is far more effective at close range, against pyros, and underwater. Puff-and-sting tactic users would probably be better off with the shotgun as it's easier to aim at short range than the flare gun/detonator can be. For people who use this tactic, Reserve Shooter is probably better suited, since you get the faster weapon switch and the mini-crit boost on airborne targets.
Detonator, however, has excellent utility. The only functional difference between the detonator and flare gun is that detonator flares are only supposed to mini-crit burning targets, however due to a bug since the weapon's release, you can guarentee criticals with your detonator by switching off the detonator after firing. Until they fix that bug, there is seemingly no reason to use the flare gun (though the weapon switching forces a lower firing rate, Degreaser or not). On top of that, you can manually explode flares from the detonator, giving you the ability to set multiple targets on fire or hit people around corners (or make up for your lack of flare accuracy). In addition, a detonator flare can give you a quick boosted jump at the cost of about 40 health. This jump only gets you about as high as a scout's double jump, but this can let the pyro get into some pretty sneaky areas.
Funny thing, i've never done this, but aparently if you carry a detonator, it's possibly to detonate deflected detonator flares by deflecting, pulling your own detonator, then pressing alt-fire. The only detonator flare i've ever deflected (and known it) though careened into a burning medic and killed him before I knew what happened.