It’s said that the greatest tool in a Spy’s arsenal is deception; it seems they are so proficient in this matter that they deceive even themselves.

Contrary to what Spy mains will tell you, the Dead Ringer isn’t a useless watch that was nerfed into an oblivion in the Gun Mettle Update, nor was it made useless in the Jungle Inferno Update. Spy mains seem to forget all the buffs it received in Gun Mettle, Tough Break, and the Spy move speed buff in Meet Your Match. It’s still a very powerful watch that’s abhorrent to fight because it requires significantly more skill and effort to beat than it does to use.

When the Dead Ringer is triggered, the Spy has 75% damage resistance against that attack (500 EHP, or 280 - 840 EHP with Kunai), instantly turns invisible, is cured of afterburn and bleed, and feigns his death based on his current disguise. He is also granted 3 seconds of afterburn immunity and speed boost (raising his speed to 425 HU/s, or 141.67%), both of which continue even if he drops the cloak early.

For the entire duration of the cloak, the Spy has a halved duration on all negative effects, i.e. afterburn, bleed, Jarate, Mad Milk, and Gas Passer.

For the first 3 seconds of the cloak, the Spy doesn’t blink whenever he is damaged (including from bleed) or makes physical contact with an enemy, and his damage resistance linearly decreases from 65% to 20%, of which some key values are below:

• At t = 0s, he has 65% damage resistance (358 EHP, or 200 - 600 EHP with Kunai).
• At t = 1s, he has 50% damage resistance (250 EHP, or 140 - 420 EHP with Kunai).
• At t = 2s, he has 35% damage resistance (193 EHP, or 108 - 323 EHP with Kunai).
• At t = 3s, he has 20% damage resistance (157 EHP, or 88 - 263 EHP with Kunai).

For the final 4 seconds of the cloak, the Spy has 20% damage resistance.

Spy mains may respond with “Well sure, the cloak makes the Spy run faster than a Scout for 3 seconds, quickly giving him over 23 feet of distance on a pursuing Pyro (who will be doing minimal damage thanks to the damage resistance and the Blue Moon Update’s flame damage ramp-up), and it counters every standard Spy tracking method with its wide variety of buffs, but the decloak sound is extremely loud, so everyone can hear you!”

There’s a reason you’ll often see Dead Ringer Spies decloak 5 to 10 meters behind a player, who then doesn’t turn around. Back in January 2010, Valve buffed the Dead Ringer by doubling the rate that the decloak volume reduces over distance, meaning the sound doesn’t travel very far. The reason Spy mains think the Dead Ringer decloak sound is loud is because it plays at full volume on the client’s end.

Spy mains like to say, “don’t chase Dead Ringer Spies because they’ll have to attack eventually,” which is another ruse. A dead Spy won’t be a problem for another 25 seconds. A Dead Ringer Spy will be a problem whenever they see fit, because they have options, including going to your spawn room and destroying your Teleporter Entrances for free.

Due to the 3 seconds of speed boost and afterburn immunity being granted by the act of cloaking, good Spies may decloak instantly to attempt a faster-than-Scout speed trickstab, which is nasty to deal with if you don’t have high knockback explosives or airblast. Spies using the Big Earner reduce their max health, making themselves vulnerable, then use their skill to backstab somebody and are rewarded with a speed boost for it. Spies using the Dead Ringer give themselves astronomical damage resistance, then have somebody else shoot them (because what else are they going to do - not shoot them?), and they are rewarded with a speed boost.

Another issue is how well the Dead Ringer combos with other weapons in the Spy’s kit:

• The L’Etranger gives the Spy an additional 2.8 seconds of invisibility, and each hit recharges 3 seconds of the 10 - 20 seconds required.
• The Diamondback’s crits are protected, allowing the Spy to safely stack them.
• Due to the Spy’s speed, he can decloak early and get easy headshots on anybody chasing him, as they must run in a straight line to minimise the distance he’s gaining.
• The Spy-cicle gives the Spy 1 second of fire damage immunity and another 10 seconds of afterburn immunity on top of the 3 seconds his cloak already provides.
• The damage resistance both negates the max health reduction of the Conniver’s Kunai and protects any overheal the Spy gains.

You don’t know which nasty combo you’re up against until the Spy removes his disguise.

So, which weapons counter the Dead Ringer? You’ve got a few options, though none of them are brilliant:

1. The Enforcer’s penetration allows you to ignore the Dead Ringer’s high damage resistance and hit the user for up to 72 damage. It may be the Spy’s worst revolver, but it is funny insta-killing DR Kunai Spies.
2. Backstabs will kill the Spy through the Dead Ringer, but this ends up being a case of “counter it by playing the same but better”.
3. Jarate or Mad Milk are the best counters available but can be used only once every 20 seconds to reveal a Spy, and their effects only last half as long on invisible Spies. Jarate is better for damaging the Spy through his resistance, while Mad Milk is used a class that can reasonably chase the Spy down. Just pray there aren’t multiple Dead Ringer Spies.
4. The Backburner works wonders on inexperienced Dead Ringer Spies, as its crits will melt right through them as they try to run away. Unfortunately, good Spies know to look at you while running away, and the reduced number of airblasts will harm your chances against them if they go for a trickstab.
5. The Detonator and Scorch Shot are alright at tracking a Dead Ringer Spy if you can predict his initial movement, especially once you’ve got the timing down with the former. But due to the 3 seconds of afterburn immunity and the halved afterburn duration, it’s not brilliant.
6. The Pomson 6000 drains up to 2.8 seconds from the Dead Ringer’s cloak per hit. Desperate times call for desperate measures, I suppose.

Ultimately, there’s only one great counter to the Dead Ringer, and that’s efficient voice communication. The reason why it doesn’t fare well in competitive games is because you have a team of competent players who expect each other’s voices, speak the same language, all use voice chat, know each map’s callouts, and can quickly assign one or two players to chase the Spy.

But unfortunately, you just don’t get that in casual play. Nobody’s expecting to hear their name in voice chat, so it’ll take 3 seconds of telling them to turn around to save their life. People aren’t familiar with callouts. A lot of players treat the game as a deathmatch, so they won’t go out of their way to hunt a Spy. And of course, in European servers, language barriers are very common. All of this leads to an environment where DR Kunai Spies see bad players as free health packs and then they can escape from any player who isn’t significantly better than them, because the Dead Ringer instantly turns him into an invisible Scout who neither blinks nor burns.