TF2 Newbs (Team Fortress 2) Blog

TL;DR: Valve takes steps against the phishing and pirating industries; news at 11. We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming.

 

Previously, I blogged in this space about changes Steam made to your trading options, which were made to combat virtual item piracy. Yesterday, Valve further restricted trading options as well as the marketability of newly-dropped items. Below are the changes in a was-versus-now format.

Trading items with a Steam Friend (and one/both of you are not using Steam Guard Mobile Authenticator)

Was:

• 1 day hold for trades to Steam Friends you friended over a year ago
• 3 day hold for Steam Friends friended more recently

Now:

• 1 day hold for trades to Steam Friends you friended over a year ago
• 15 day hold for Steam Friends friended more recently

Trading items with a Steam Friend (and both are using the Mobile Authenticator)

Was: no holds

Now: no holds

 

Steam says that 95% of traders now use the Mobile Authenticator to expedite their trades (before the December client update, very few users used it). So using the Mobile Authenticator is becoming the new legit standard for traders of valuable Steam virtual items.

Why a 15-day hold? Steam says that less frequent users “need more time” to learn and respond to their compromised accounts. (Been hacked? Contact Steam here.)

Note: Games that you buy (or receive from other users as a gift or trade) that you assign to your gift inventory still begin a 30-day cooldown period before you can trade/gift it on to someone else. If you want to buy a game for someone else to play immediately, gift it to that person at the moment of purchase.

 

Putting your items on the Steam Market (not using the Mobile Authenticator)

Was: no hold

Now: 15 day hold before the item is listed

Did you pull a nifty new cosmetic weapon that you want to Market? Well, if you’re not using the Mobile Authenticator, you have to wait fifteen days for the item to hit the Market.

“But wait–don’t you have to input the price beforehand? …and isn’t it likely for the demand to change before your item lists? …and for you to change the price, you’ll have to re-list the item, and then it’s held for another two weeks?” Probably.

 

Steam Ends Duplication Policy

Steam will no longer restore a player’s hacked account by creating duplicates of missing items. You can argue your own case as to why; I said my piece after the previous change.

 

Please note that the above changes begin on Wednesday, March 9th. Expect a Steam Client update sometime that day.

ICYMI: A previous Steam Client patch now prevents you from starting/receiving a chat (text) message in Steam from users who are not friended, currently playing in a server with you, or currently joining a group chatroom with you.

[N] Obey

 

(start of Valve blogpost)

Recently we walked through our thinking on account security and trading [http://store.steampowered.com/news/19618/], and introduced some new tools for users to protect their accounts. Now that we’ve had some time to gather data, we’ll be making a few more changes to account security, market transactions, and our account restoration process.

Below are the changes that will take place on March 9th. If you are already protected by the Steam Guard Mobile Authenticator (or if you add the security feature to your account today), the first two points below will not impact you:

• Trade hold duration will be increased to 15 days (for long-time Steam friends the duration will remain 1 day)
• Listing on the Steam Community Market will have a hold of 15 days before an item can be sold
• Steam Support will no longer restore items that have left accounts following a successful trade or market transaction (a process that previously created duplicates of original items)

To help understand these changes, we wanted to walk you through the results we’ve seen so far and our reasoning behind these next steps.

First, it’s worth revisiting our goals behind the two main ways customers interact with in-game economies on Steam: Trading and the Steam Community Market. Our primary goal for Trading is to allow customers to easily exchange items with their friends. Our goal for the Steam Community Market is to provide customers with a way to sell any unwanted goods to other players. Both systems work well for these purposes, but they can be a source of pain if the security of your account is ever compromised.

 

Account and Item Theft

In December we took steps to improve account security by adding more security features, including the Steam Guard Mobile Authenticator and trade holds.

Since then, we’ve seen lots of users adopting the Steam Guard Mobile Authenticator (two-factor authentication) for trade and market confirmations, and now roughly 95% of daily trades use the mobile authenticator, with trade volumes as high as ever. The authenticator is the best tool that users have to protect their accounts, and the fastest and most secure way to trade items.

 

Trade Holds

For users who have yet to transition to the Steam Guard Mobile Authenticator, trade holds provide a way to continue to exchange items. Items in a trade hold are held by Steam for a period of time before delivery. This allows users whose accounts have been compromised to quickly cancel any fraudulent trades to recover their items. Trade holds are effective, but unfortunately the current three-day hold fails to protect users who log in less frequently and who need more time to identify a problem. So we’ll be adjusting the system to accommodate the majority of customers by increasing trade holds to 15 days.

If you’re exchanging items with a friend, and you’ve been friends for more than a year, don’t worry – the trade hold duration is still one day.

 

Market Holds

Trade holds have been successful, but until now they’ve been limited to trades. If the Steam Guard Mobile Authenticator was not enabled on a user’s account, it was still possible for a hacker to quickly liquidate a user’s inventory through the Steam Community Market. To further protect users who haven’t enabled the authenticator, holds will now also apply when you list items on the Steam Community Market. Market listing (like trades) will still be instantaneous if you’re using the Steam Guard Mobile Authenticator.

 

Item Duplication

Since the last account security update, we’ve made significant progress in protecting accounts. In addition to significantly increasing the size of Steam Support to improve response times, individual accounts protected by the Steam Guard Mobile Authenticator on a separate device turned out to be even more effective than we’d hoped. For customers who have yet to add the Steam Guard Mobile Authenticator, trade holds have been helpful in keeping items secure, and we expect that the added duration and extension of holds to the Steam Community Market will further improve security.

Our work isn’t finished, but we’ve seen enough progress in account security to finally address an old problem: item duplication. Currently, if an account is compromised and items have been lost through a successful trade or market transaction, we would manually restore the items, creating duplicates of the original items in the process. That process of manual restoration and duplication has the negative side effect of changing an item’s scarcity – as more copies of the item are created, the value of every other similar item is reduced. In addition, it created a method by which users could be rewarded for faking account hijacks.

While we’ll continue to assist users with the recovery of their account if they encounter an issue, beginning March 9th we will no longer be manually restoring items that have left the account due to a successful trade or market transaction.

 

Balance

There’s a delicate balance between account security and the convenience of interacting with the market or trade. Any time we make changes, there’s the risk of significant disruption. We recognize that today’s changes will be inconvenient for users who have yet (or are unable) to use the Steam Guard Mobile Authenticator. But if you’re a high volume trader (who our data shows is likely using the authenticator already), or a trader who likes to exchange items with friends, these changes won’t really affect you at all. We believe these steps are necessary to ensure that accounts are made more secure, that users are empowered to identify and solve problems, and that the economic systems enjoyed by millions of customers are not compromised by people with malicious intent.

Account security is an issue that affects everyone, and we hope this post has helped to explain our goals and reasoning as we move forward. Please continue to provide your feedback and account security ideas in the Steam forums and elsewhere on the web.

(end blogpost)

The “Gun Mettle” optional campaign is still going, but TF2 has elected to inject more items and item options. Here’s the summary:

1. You can now Trade Up 10 Gun Mettle weapons of the same tier for a random weapon of the next highest tier.
   • Many mid-tier weapons are now increasing in Market price: see below.
2. Gun Mettle Cosmetic Cases can now drop for players with a Campaign Coin.
   • Apparently drops once per week, so there’s a random chance you’ll get one per week.
   • Requires a Gun Mettle Cosmetic Key to open.
   • Items from this case are marketable. Chance of items to be Strange (or an Unusual Hat).
3. PASS Time and Server Browser bugfixes.
   • Servers running a Beta PASS Time map now longer need to utilize sv_cheats to access many console features now.
4. 8/28/15 Patch: Mostly bugfixes and item model updates.

Here is a link to the relevant blogpost.

Some prices in this guide were updated on August 30th.

1. Gun Mettle Trade Up

Oh, great. You finally finished a frustrating contract of a class you’ve not very skilled at, and earned another low-tier weapon you already have. That’s no fun. (Look at the top image of this blogpost–Scout has way too many Backcountry Blasters!)

Now, you can do something with your extra, unwanted Gun Mettle weapons. You can take ten Gun Mettle weapons of the same tier, and convert them to one random weapon of the next highest tier. Right-click a Gun Mettle weapon from your backpack and choose “Mann Co. Trade Up”.

 

 

A postcard pop-up will appear. The first weapon locks in what tier of weapons you can then conveniently choose from to fill out the remainder of the “coupon”.

Click on “Mail In”, click on the “Stamp” button, and then Mann Co.’s super shipping service will drop you a random weapon of the next tier. (If you need to see this process in more detail, see this post on Imgur.)

As a reminder, here is a list of the six weapon tiers, from my previous Gun Mettle blog post:

1. Civilian–contracts only
2. Freelance–contracts only
3. Mercenary–contracts or weapons cases
4. Commando–contracts or weapons cases
5. Assassin–weapons cases only
6. Elite–weapons cases only

Regardless of whether you mix weapons of different paint styles (Teufort, Craftsmann, Concealed Killer, Powerhouse), the weapon output *should* be random. Trading in ten tier 4 Teufort weapons (or any other combination) should output either a Tier 5 CK or Tier 5 PH weapon.

 

Trade Up’s Effect on the Market

Three weeks before this writing, I blogged in this space about the current prices of various TF2 items. Well, being able to trade in Gun Mettle weapons should surely have an effect on their value in the Market. In the 24 hours since the launch of this patch, here is what I have observed regarding Gun Mettle weapons:

• Tier 1 “Civilian” weapon prices are staying the same.

Each weapon has over 200 copies of each wear grade for sale, and the upgrade of ten $0.05 items to potentially another $0.10 item hasn’t yet affected the prices of Tier 1 weapons.

• Tier 2 “Freelance” and Tier 3 “Mercenary” weapons are spiking up.

Users are buying up the cheapest Tier 2, Tier 3, Tier 4, and Tier 5 weapons they can find, ostensibly to combine with their own extras and convert them to a higher-tier weapon. There are now fewer Battle-Scarred and Well-Worn versions of these weapons left for sale on the Market than before, since those had been the cheapest.

For example, a non-Strange “Forest Fire” Tier 3 flamethrower had been trading for roughly $0.06 to $0.35, depending on its wear. Forest Fire is now selling from $0.15 to $0.55, or effectively double what it cost before (see image above). Also, there are only dozens left on the Market, instead of hundreds previously. This tells us:

• Some Tier 4 and Tier 5 weapons have also spiked, and some versions are becoming rare.

(Updated Aug 30) For a couple of days after this patch, you couldn’t buy a Tier 5 “Sudden Flurry” stickiebomb launcher for less than US$2, whereas three weeks ago the higher-wear varieties for selling for well under $1. Now, the value has fallen back to about $1 in most cases. (Remember, previously Tier 5s and Tier 6s were only available by unlocking Cases by key.) Users are buying them up to trade in for a Tier 6 weapon. Meanwhile, the Factory New version are staying roughly the same price, since those are the versions that people want to buy and keep. As a result:

• (Updated Aug 30) Some Tier 5 and Tier 6 weapons are gently falling in price.

“Factory New” weapons, as well as the other grades, are becoming more commonplace on the Market as users are selling weapons they received while trying to earn something else. Some higher-wear Tier 5s are increasing in price as a few users craft a Tier 6, while some are slowly falling as supply increases.

Now, you should consider whether you want to sell a mid-tier item–while demand is increasing for those buying them up, and while the supply is still there for players to trade up items–or keep it in the chance of it being rare later.  Or ignore all of this, and go kill some fools on 2Fort with your fancy weapons :p

TL;DR version: Keep your Factory New and Minimal Wear weapons. Consider selling or Trading Up the others, unless you simply love the looks of your Battle-Scarred Forest Fire.

Remember: All Gun Mettle weapons are Limited, and they will no longer drop after September 30, 2015. Meanwhile, the TF2 community continues to grow–especially with new players–so the demand for many of these weapons could rise after Gun Mettle ends.

 

2. Gun Mettle Cosmetic Cases (aka Crate #95)

The Gun Mettle Cosmetic Case is a special crate that will drop only for Campaign Coin holders and, according to the TF2 Blog, will only drop once a week (and a random chance of it doing so). Just assume that it is a rare crate, but you still have to buy a Gun Mettle Cosmetic Key to open it.

(As of August 30th, the cases are selling for about US$2 on the Market, and I expect that price to fall this week.)

There are 16 possible items in a #95 Gun Mettle Cosmetic Case. All of these items, as well as the Cases themselves, are Marketable and tradable. They are not yet craftable or dropping in the Item Drop system.

Commissar’s Coat		7 .14%
Flak Jack		7 .14%
Lurker’s Leathers		7 .14%
Rotation Sensation		7 .14%
Support Spurs		7 .14%
Vascular Vestment		7 .14%
Wild West Waistcoat		7 .14%
Fortunate Son		6 .25%
Outta’ Sight		6 .25%
Physician’s Protector		6 .25%
White Russian		6 .25%
Bruce’s Bonnet		5 .33%
El Duderino		5 .33%
Sheriff’s Stetson		5 .33%
Captain Cardbeard Cutthroat		4 .00%
Potassium Bonnett		4 .00%
or an Exceedingly Rare Special Item!		1 .00%

 

That White Russian, tho. The Heavy abides:

3. More Gun Mettle Minutiae

• You can now buy Map Stamps and Strange Filters for the maps Powerhouse, Suijin, Snowplow, and Borneo.
• The new Gun Mettle Cosmetic Cases is tabbed Crate #95.
• Concealed Killer Cases are now tabbed as Crate #93.
• Powerhouse Cases are now tabbed as Crate #94.

For your convenience, here are the #93 and #94 drop lists. Note that the listed percentage chances may not be correct; they were lifted from the Official TF2 Wiki.

Powerhouse Case

Crate Series #94
Drops		No
Items
Thunderbolt		6 .60%
Liquid Asset		6 .60%
Shell Shocker		6 .60%
Current Event		6 .60%
Pink Elephant		6 .60%
Flash Fryer		6 .60%
Spark of Life		6 .60%
Dead Reckoner		6 .60%
Black Dahlia		6 .60%
Sandstone Special		6 .60%
Lightning Rod		6 .60%
Brick House		6 .60%
Aqua Marine		6 .60%
Low Profile		6 .60%
Turbine Torcher		6 .60%
or an Exceedingly Rare Unusual Weapon!		1 .00%

Concealed Killer Cases have been tabbed as Crate #93.

Crate Series #93
Drops		No
Items
Red Rock Roscoe		6 .60%
Sand Cannon		6 .60%
Sudden Flurry		6 .60%
Psychedelic Slugger		6 .60%
Purple Range		6 .60%
Night Terror		6 .60%
Carpet Bomber		6 .60%
Woodland Warrior		6 .60%
Wrapped Reviver		6 .60%
Forest Fire		6 .60%
Night Owl		6 .60%
Woodsy Widowmaker		6 .60%
Backwoods Boomstick		6 .60%
King of the Jungle		6 .60%
Masked Mender		6 .60%
or an Exceedingly Rare Unusual Weapon!		1 .00%

Full Patch Notes: Aug 27, 2015

• Added Collection Trade-Ups!
  • Check out the blog post for more information
• Added Map Stamps and Strange Filters for the featured maps in the Gun Mettle Campaign
• Added the Gun Mettle Cosmetic Case which contains new community cosmetic items^[1]
  • Gun Mettle Cosmetic Case can only be found by players with a campaign coin
  • Cosmetics in a collection can be listed on the Steam Community Market
• All Strange items now have a visible icon in backpack panels
• Added an option button to display paints and/or styles options for items in the Mann Co. Store preview page and the Steam Workshop item import tool
• Added the OWL 14 tournament medals
• Added a Steam Community Profile option to the player right-click context menu in the scoreboard
• Fixed a buffer overflow exploit (thanks to Didrole for this report)
• Fixed a Mann vs. Machine exploit related to purchasing upgrades while not at an upgrade station
• Fixed a Mann vs. Machine exploit related to the Medigun shield
• Fixed the Gun Mettle Coin not displaying its proper level in the Steam Community view
• Fixed the Enforcer getting a damage bonus as the Spy was disguising and not fully disguised
• Fixed the cvarlist command truncating some cvar/command descriptions
• Fixed hitting ‘Enter’ while in the backpack menu triggering buttons in the main menu
• Fixed invalid map names in nextlevel convar or the map cycle causing the server to fail to change level after displaying the score panel
• Fixed the Engineer losing revenge crits and picked-up weapons after using The Eureka Effect to teleport back to base
• The Dalokohs Bar can now accept Ally Healing Done strange parts
• Updated several HUD elements to include the name of the weapon’s owner when a player is carrying a weapon they picked-up
• Updated the materials for the Stickybomb Launcher
• Updated Mann Co. Store prices for foreign currencies to current USD equivalents
• Updated the localization files
• PASS Time update
  • Fixed scoring in your own goal if you change teams while the jack is in flight
  • Fixed disguised and cloaked enemy Spies having a shield drawn for them in the HUD
  • Fixed players sometimes not being able to throw the jack
  • Fixed another case where players could teleport the jack with The Eureka Effect
  • Fixed The Dead Ringer making it impossible to throw the jack or deactivate the Dead Ringer
  • All global special abilities that are activated with alt-fire are now available while carrying the jack, unless you’re actively aiming the jack
  • Unlocked console variables for community servers to experiment with without requiring sv_cheats
  • Fixed Scouts being able to pick up the jack while drinking
  • Fixed disguised Spies being able to carry the jack in some situations
  • Made weapon switch faster after throwing the jack
  • Fixed not getting a speed boost if you score and then get the jack after it respawns
  • Fixed a crash if mp_tournament was enabled and someone scored during pre-game
  • Improved the way blocking works
  • Fixed being able to cancel enemy taunts by hitting them with the ball
  • Fixed seeing a phantom jack in your hand if you threw the jack and couldn’t switch back to your previous weapon (jars, cleavers, etc.)
  • Updated pass_warehouse
    • Fixed issue with jack getting stuck behind props
    • Fixed exploit of jack getting stuck in dropper
    • Fixed issue with unbalanced ammo and health kits
    • Moved resupply closets further from the doors
    • Added plank walkway to central warehouses on top of the containers
• Server Browser
  • Fixed the history tab of the server browser failing to record servers
  • Fixed the spectate tab of the server browser not working at all
  • Fixed the game info dialog for SourceTV master servers improperly showing the server as not responding
  • Fixed connecting to SourceTV servers via the Favorites tab in the server browser
  • Fixed SourceTV relay servers not properly registering on the server list in some situations
  • Fixed the game info dialog for SourceTV relay servers not allowing connection despite open slots
  • Fixed SourceTV relay servers appearing to have negative max players
• Maps Workshop Beta
  • Fixed map cycle files specified before the initial map load not properly tracking workshop maps
  • Fixed game servers using registered accounts via sv_setsteamaccount being unable to access workshop content
  • Fixed servers getting stuck in a loop when the nextlevel convar contains a un-loadable workshop map

   

Full Patch Notes: Aug 28, 2015

• Fixed a security issue related to map loading (thanks to Nathaniel Theis for this report)
• Fixed a client crash related to custom HUDs
• Fixed a client crash related to the material system
• Fixed Gun Mettle weapons not always displaying their wear level in the tool tip
• Fixed the Lurker’s Leathers not using the correct Blue team material
• Fixed a bug in Mann vs. Machine that allowed players to refund credits without losing their upgrades
• Fixed a bug in Mann vs. Machine related to the Medigun shield
• The Dalokohs Bar can now accept Allies Extinguished strange parts
• Updated the materials and model for the Outta’ Sight
• Updated the The Crosslinker’s Coil, The Brütal Bouffant, and The Wilson Weave to add a ‘No Headphones’ style
• Updated the localization files

[N] Obey

P.S. I’ll probably do another price guide in about 2-3 weeks, once the Market stabilizes from the changes in this patch.

Steam has made some changes to the client software in an attempt to reduce the number of phisher/hacker accounts. Rest assured that the following doesn’t apply to you if you have ever spent at least US$5 lifetime at the Steam Store.

UPDATE 5/31/15:  Valve explains their reasons for having limited users to PC Gamer.

A limited user is any Steam account that has not yet spent at least US$5.00 at the Steam Store; such a user is similar to a universal free-to-play account. Limited User accounts have had many of the functions of the Steam client removed–mostly to prevent phishers and hackers from creating throwaway Steam accounts. Among the features that are now disabled for Limited User accounts include:

• Sending friend invites
• Voting or posting on anything in Steam Workshop, Greenlight, or Reviews for a game/software
• Opening text chat windows with another user or groups
• Gaining Steam Profile Levels and Steam Trading Cards
• Participating in the Steam Market

The above restrictions are lifted if the user buys a game(s) of at least $5 value in the Steam Store for yourself or as a gift, buys at least $5 worth of Steam Wallet funds, or adds a prepurchased Steam card to the account.

Limited User accounts can still play free-to-play games on Steam, promotional trial games like Free Weekends, receive and play gift games from another person, trade games and/or in-game items, and activate promotional CD keys (like from hardware companies or a Humble Bundle). However, none of these actions will earn full user access; at least $5 of funds and/or content must be purchased from Steam (or a Steam card from a third-party, and then applied) to remove the Limited User restrictions. Again, receiving a game(s) or in-game items as gifts will not remove the restrictions.

 

[N] Obey

Been up all night getting duckies? Catch up with the Newbs News below!  As usual, the summary is at the top, and the full patch notes are at the bottom.

1. You can turn unwanted items in your Steam inventory into Gems, a currency used to bid for new games during Steam Auction periods.
   • You can recycle items into Gems. Gems are marketable in stacks of 1,000.
   • You can buy booster cardpacks with Gems.
   • You can bid for Steam games with Gems.
2. Server provider Packhead is no longer streaming 24/7 Christmas music through 12/25.
3. Participate in the monthly Server #15 Stats Contest and win keys!
4. Wanna sign up for some TF2 Newbs Secret Santa give-and-take?
5. Post-EotL TF2 Patches
   • Redesigned the Backpack Panel: Click on an item for a drop-down menu of actions to choose from.
   • Added the Cold Snap Coat to the EotL Community Crate #87.
   • Fixed Halloween footsteps being displayed for disguised Spies… heheheh.
   • Check the previous blogpost for info on the “End of the Line” Update!
6. [Added 12/15/14] TF2 Newbs’ Server Rules have been modified/clarified in regards to dodging autobalance.
   • TL;DR: Don’t dodge autobalance, as you can be banned for it, especially if your behavior causes the server to empty. Please refer to the specific text in the link above.

 

1. Steam Auctions: Turn Unwanted Items into New Games

Splash page here, scroll down for rules. Comic here.

This promotion focuses on three new features offered by Steam:

1. You can now “recycle” or turn unwanted Steam inventory items into Gems, a permanent Steam currency
2. The ability to purchase Steam card packs with Gems
3. The ability to bid for new Steam games with Gems on a rotation Auction schedule

“Recycle” Your Unwanted Steam Items

 

Here’s the deal: Most of us Steam gamers have inventories of items that we will never use: backgrounds, emoticons, cards,  etc.  Steam now lets you turn those into Gems, a currency that you use to spend on packs of cards of a Steam game of your choice, or to place bids in the Holiday Auction.  Simply click on an item, and scroll down to see how much the item is worth in Gems (just above the Steam Market’s lowest going-for price). With one click, you can turn it into Gems!

 

Gems exist in your Steam inventory as an item. Gems are tradable, but not marketable as-is. A “Sack of Gems”, in increments of 1,000, can be marketed! As of this post, they are selling for about US$0.66 to US$0.72 in Steam Wallet Funds.

Gift copies of games, in-game items, and coupons are not recyclable for gems. Cards are worth very few Gems (usually less than 30). The popularity of the game and/or the lowest Market Price of the item affects how many Gems the item returns when recycled, so rarer items are worth more Gems. For example, one medikit emoticon from TF2 recycles into 100 Gems.

If you intend to participate in a Steam Auction, you will want to have Gems in the tens of thousands. (If you are NOT going to participate in the Steam Auction, and want some more Steam Wallet Funds, I suggest that you sell all of the items you wish and quicksell the Gems while the demand is high.)  Gems are a permanent currency and will remain after the Holiday Auction promotion.

Buy Steam Card Booster Packs with Gems

Click on your Gems, or this link, to find the button to the screen where you buy Booster Packs. A Booster Pack has three random cards of the game’s set, and collecting them will increase your level badge for the game (which earns you more Steam Items which you may keep, recycle, or Market), as well as earn you EXP towards leveling up your Steam Profile. NOTE: You can only purchase one Booster Pack with Gems per game, per day.

Each Steam game that features Steam Trading Cards will now show its price, in Gems, to buy a Booster Pack. For example, the screenshot above shows TF2 Booster Packs can be bought for 667 Gems each.

This feature will remain permanent, even after the Steam Holiday Auction ends. Perhaps you can buy more things with Gems at a later date?

 

Bid on Steam Games in the Auction

First, go to the Auction and place a “maximum bid” of Gems on a game of your choice, which may or may not be higher than the current Highest Bid. Bids that you place remove that many Gems from your inventory. Then you wait.

The first copy of the game will sell to the Highest Bidder on December 15th at 7:45 AM PST. After that, one more copy of the game will sell to the newest Highest Bidder every 45 minutes, 24 hours a day, until 100 games are sold and the Auction ends on Thursday, December 18th at 10:00 AM PST. After that, all the remaining bids will be deleted and your Gems returned to your inventory.

Don’t forget that a Sack of 1,000 Gems market for roughly US$0.70 (as of this post), so I doubt that you would want to bid more than $20 worth of Gems (28,600 ish) for a $20 game.  It’s not a fundraising event, but you might score a new game that hopefully someone hasn’t bought you for Christmas already!

 

2. Packhead Still Christmasing It Up In Here

While you consider that unusual conjugation of the word “Christmas”, you can listen to over 300 modern and classic Christmas songs thanks to Packhead, who provides some of our servers.  Just click on the M3U button to choose a program to stream through your internet connection.

 

3. December Stats Content for Server #15!

Hey, there’s still plenty of December left to muscle in and take a title! The following five contests are taking place on this 24/7 Hightower server!

connect s15.tf2newbs.com

• Most Points (the player points earned as displayed in your HUD)
• Most Backstabs
• Time Played (because idling also helps keep servers full)
• Most Airblasts
• Most Kill Assists as a Medic

Click here to pull up a list of Server #15 stats, then choose the stat to pull up the list of who is winning.  The top performer of each stat will win a prize (limit one contest win per month).

 

4. Secret Santa Stuff

If you would like to participate in Secret Santa, click here to sign up!

 

5. Post-EotL TF2 Patches

New Cosmetic: the Cold Snap Coat

The Cold Snap Coat is a tradable, giftable, paintable, and craftable Soldier cosmetic that was added to the EotL Crate #87 on December 12th. Like all items from that crate, there is a chance of it having the Strange quality when uncrated. It is not yet available for purchase. Paint affects the brown jacket collar around the Soldier’s neck only.

Full Patch Notes: 12/12/14

• Added the Cold Snap Coat to the End of the Line Community Crate
• Fixed a client crash related to ragdolls
• Fixed a client crash related to the material system
• Fixed the backpack panel not highlighting the currently selected page number
• Fixed Halloween footstep spells being displayed for disguised Spies
• Fixed The Swagman’s Swatter not being held by the Sniper for lower LOD settings during the melee taunt
• Updated the materials for The Peacenik’s Ponytail and added a new style
• Updated The Li’l Dutchman to fix a jiggle bone issue
• Updated The Ghost of Spies Checked Past to fix a jiggle bone issue
• Updated Mann Co. Store prices for foreign currencies to current USD equivalents
• Updated the localization files

Full Patch Notes: 12/10/14

• Fixed a client crash related to the main menu
• Fixed the Engineer PDA being stored as the last weapon used
• Fixed the Objective leaderboard not updating for Objective ducks
• Updated the equip_region and bodygroup settings for some of the new cosmetic items^[1][2]

Undocumented Changes

• Updated the item type of a number of new cosmetic items ^[3]
• Made the Duck Journal nameable
• Updated BLU Hunter Heavy texture.

 

Full Patch Notes: 12/9/14

• Fixed a client crash related to the material system
• Fixed the Restore command not working properly in the backpack panel’s context menu
• Fixed a crash in the item import tool
• Fixed updating Duck Journal stats from ducks created on servers using sv_cheats
• Fixed the Taunt: Pool Party item to fix a problem with the pool not scaling smoothly
• Updated the materials for the Hunter Heavy and the North Polar Fleece

Notes missed from the previous update:

• End of the Line Key, Duck Journal, and Duck Token sales support the End of the Line team
• Redesigned the backpack panel
  • Clicking on an item creates a context menu that lists the valid actions for that item
  • The context menu replaces the buttons that were used for interacting with items

 

[N] Obey

Whoops, I forgot to post the patch update!  It is minor, but apparently one nifty undocumented change has appeared:

Some TF2 Items Are Now “Commodities”

…Do what now?

You may recall that back in June ’14, the option to make Buy Orders was introduced to the Steam Market.  When you place a Buy Order, you choose an item that you want to buy as soon as it hits the Market at or under your asking price. It won’t matter who you’re buying from; whenever an item goes on sale, it will check against all the Buy Orders out there that meet its terms, which can also help you sell an item instantly if you sell it under an existing Buy Order’s asking price.  You can have as many Buy Orders as ten times your Steam Wallet’s current value.

Before this week, the only Commodities–items you can buy with Buy Orders–in the Steam Market were the following:

• All Steam Trading Cards and Trading Card Booster Packs
• All Emoticons
• All Profile Backgrounds

Obviously, they were probably testing the Market functionality for several months with items that had both little value and a high volume of existing items.  They must be happy with the results, because they are now increasing the number of items that are Commodities, and therefore can be bought with Buy Orders.  All of the new items are tools, and this is significant:

• Mann Co. Crate Keys (!!)
• Mann Co. Supply Crates and Summer Claim Checks
  • I am unsure if this includes Mann Co. Select or Salvaged crates or not.
• Robot Parts
• Strangifiers, Strange Parts and Strange Filters
• Piles of RoboKey Gifts and Piles of Summer Cooler Key Gifts
  • But single Mann Co. RoboKeys and the nine colored Summer Cooler Keys do not seem to be commodities yet.
• Decal Tools
• Gift Wrap
• Backpack Expanders
• Upgrade to Premium Gifts
• Summer Starter Kits and Summer Adventure Packs

So for example, you can set a Buy Order for Crate Keys for $2, and as soon as one goes for sale at $2 or less, you (and anyone else that has a Buy Order) that qualifies can be sold the keys that go for sale as soon as they hit the market.  Valve doesn’t say whether the “oldest” Buy Order goes through first, or some other random method, so don’t assume that you will get the first item to be placed on the Market for that price. But at least in the case of keys, if you’re patient, eventually someone will quicksell a key for your asking price if you’re sane about it.

In economics, a commodity is something that is always in-demand–such as pork bellies, wheat, or even skilled labor–but in plentiful enough supply that they see frequent trade.

Meanwhile, a currency is something that is assigned an arbitrary value to act as a middleman for trading wealth.  For the last few years, metal, keys, earbuds and certain hats like Bill’s Hat have been acting as a currency, i.e. tradeable items have been valued in terms of these currencies, like “this unusual hat is worth 1.5 buds”.  But since some items being traded also have their own useful function–i.e. keys can be used on crates, and they can be bought through the Mann Co. Store with almost no real limit to supply–then tool items, like keys, are really more of a commodity.

 

Full Patch Notes

• Dedicated server performance/stability improvements
• Added a new startup music track from Expiration Date
• Added missing photos/thumb images for koth_badlands
• Fixed a client crash related to the snd_restart command for Linux clients
• Fixed a dedicated server crash related to arrows
• Fixed the Bolt Boy using the wrong material for the Blu team
• Improved memory usage for Linux clients
• Updated the Restart Game and Scramble Teams votes to always have a mandatory cool-down period
• Updated sv_memlimit to not be marked as a cheat convar
  • Added sv_minuptimelimit and sv_maxuptimelimit to manage the server restart window
• Updated the equip_regions for the Mustachioed Mann, Ze Übermensch, and Vive La France
• Updated the localization files
• Updated pl_cactuscanyon
  • Removed rollback leading to the final capture point in stage 2
  • Reworked fence position on forward spawn building in stage 2
  • Expanded back alley near the final capture point in stage 2
  • Expanded back pathway near the final capture point in stage 1
  • Added small room inside building half way up the zig-zag in stage 1
  • Adjusted health kits and ammo packs
  • Adjusted spawn times in stage 1 and 2
• Updated rd_asteroid
  • Widened left side spawn exit
  • Players can no longer build inside the staircase near A robots
  • Fixed sticky stair collision when coming out of the water near B robots
  • Changed medium health kit near the C robots to a small health kit
  • Removed aQ2W3″alert” from voice over lines that announce your team has dropped the reactor core
  • Fixed missing patch overlay under small health near center bridge

Undocumented changes

• Several items are now marked as Steam Community Market commodities.^[1]

References

1. ↑ Mann Co. Supply Crate Key, Mann Co. Supply Crate, Robot Parts, Paint Can, Strange Part, Strangifier, Strange Filter, Pile of RoboKey Gifts, Pile of Summer Cooler Key Gifts, Decal Tool, Gift Wrap, Backpack Expander, Upgrade to Premium Gift, Summer Starter Kit, Summer Adventure Pack, Summer Claim Check

 

[N] Obey