Class gamemodes

Class gamemodes are a family of community gamemodes that restrict teams to a certain class. Unlike Class Wars, the defining characteristic of these gamemodes are that weapons that are typically unusable by the class are available through pickups or custom item schemas. The most popular format is Class Team Deathmatch (referred to as just Class Deathmatch), usually only allowing the Civilian.

History

As part of her April Fools, 2024 map Crush, Wheatttt created a version of Team Deathmatch that restricted teams to Civilian, which she dubbed Civilian Deathmatch - now referred to as Class Deathmatch. Using the now-removed tf_player_equip entity, she made pickups that could give players specific weapons with almost no restrictions, and placed them throughout the map. Notably, a Rocket Launcher pickup is occasionally made accessible in the centre building, which temporarily boosts anyone who grabs it with Crits and ÜberCharge.

Inspired by Crush, Moonrider later released his own Class Deathmatch map Rift on what is presumed to be April Fools Day, 2025. It plays similarly to Crush, with weapon pickups scattered throughout the map and one powerful pickup - this time a boosted R.P.G. - made available at certain times in the centre. Rift does however feature a more vertical layout than Crush, with jump pads and staircases allowing players to traverse between the map's layers quickly.

On June 11, 2025, Static Fanatic released the map Dead End, which used a new gamemode dubbed Civilian CTF - now called Class CTF - that was initially made without knowledge of Crush or Rift. As opposed to Class Deathmatch's Team Deathmatch format, Class CTF was instead based off Capture the Flag. Unlike the Class Deathmatch maps that came before it, pickups in Dead End could only found in each team's spawn area, giving either the Tranquilizer Gun and Pistol, Revolver and SMG or Gunboats and Coilgun, allowing players to equip full loadouts as the Civilian immediately after spawning in. The pickups were later removed in favour of a custom weapons pack built into the map, allowing players to equip any combination of the six weapons from the loadout menu.

As a joke, Static Fanatic released a Class Deathmatch conversion of Dead End called Sled End on August 30, 2025. Like other Class Deathmatch maps, pickups could be found all across Sled End, though it didn't feature a powerful pickup in the centre. The map was later converted back into a CTF format and had its pickups removed, now allowing players to use any class.

Static Fanatic later reworked the Half-Life 2: Deathmatch map Powerhouse for Team Fortress 2 Classified, using a variation of CivDM where the Civilian is swapped out for Pyro, dubbed PyroDM. As the map shared its name with a stock Control Points map, Static Fanatic renamed it to Pyrohouse.

Afterwards, webb would convert Hydro (Domination) to a Class Deathmatch format.

Maps

Name	Picture	Format	Authors
Crush		Team Deathmatch (Civilian)	Wheatttt
Rift		Team Deathmatch (Civilian)	Moonrider
Dead End		Capture the Flag (Civilian)	Static Fanatic
Sled End		Capture the Flag	Static Fanatic
Pyrohouse		Team Deathmatch (Pyro)	Static Fanatic, Michael "Wolf" Schulz
Hydro (CDM)		Team Deathmatch (Civilian)	webb, Valve Software, Eminoma