Strange

 Shotgun
Strange Shotgun - Kills: 0

Strange quality is an item quality commonly used on weapons found from unlocking Mann Co. Supply Crates of certain series. Introduced in the Über Update on June 23, 2011 Patch, Strange weapons track kills and record them as an item attribute, allowing the count to be viewed by players. The weapon is then awarded a rank as the recorded count increases, with the rank affixed to the beginning of the item's name. Some Strange weapons track another action instead of kills, such as kill assists (see Notes below for exceptions). Additionally, some weapons have a second count to track other associated actions, such as Sentry Gun kills; however, the secondary count does not contribute toward rank progress. Each time the player achieves a new rank, it is announced to all players on the server with a message in the chat box; A notification pop-up also appears only for the player the weapon belongs to.

The Spirit Of Giving is an all-class miscellaneous item with the Strange quality, introduced during the Australian Christmas 2011 event. It tracks and ranks up based on gifts given with the Secret Saxton and Pile o' Gifts items. Uniquely, it has its own list of ranks, with lower thresholds between them. In its initial state, it does not display the Strange prefix, but does retain the text coloring. All players were awarded the Spirit Of Giving along with a Secret Saxton to all premium players at the time of the update. The update also introduced Festive weapons: reskins of a number of Stock weapons, braided with flickering Christmas lights. Festive weapons could be obtained in either Strange or Unique quality.

The hexadecimal color code for Strange items is #CF6A32.

Ranks

Strange weapon ranks

All Strange weapons start with an initial prefix of Strange, however this is not a rank itself. Trading a Strange weapon will cause its counter to reset to zero and its prefix to reset to Strange, unless Gift Wrap is used.

Rank	Kills	Name
0	0	Strange
1	10	Unremarkable
2	25	Scarcely Lethal
3	45	Mildly Menacing
4	70	Somewhat Threatening
5	100	Uncharitable
6	135	Notably Dangerous
7	175	Sufficiently Lethal
8	225	Truly Feared
9	275	Spectacularly Lethal
10	350	Gore-Spattered
11	500	Wicked Nasty
12	750	Positively Inhumane
13	999	Totally Ordinary
14	1000	Face-Melting
15	1500	Rage-Inducing
16	2500	Server-Clearing
17	5000	Epic
18	7500	Legendary
19	7616	Australian
20	8500	Hale's Own

Spirit Of Giving ranks

Main article: Spirit Of Giving

Rank	Gifts Given	Name
0	0	The
1	1	The Baseline Benefactor's
2	3	The Competent Contributor's
3	7	The Adequate Altruist's
4	12	The Satisfactory Santa's
5	20	The Sufficient Samaritan's
6	28	The Distinguished Donator's
7	37	The Dynamic Do-Gooder's
8	47	The Consumate Contributor's
9	57	The Baron of Bequeathment's
10	68	The Lord of Largesse's
11	79	The Chieftain of Charity's
12	91	The Generalissimo of Generosity's
13	104	The Bigshot Benefactor's
14	120	The Caesar of Pleasers'
15	138	The First-Class Philanthropist's
16	158	The Humanitarian Hotshot's
17	179	The Selfless Samaritan's
18	210	The Uber-Altruist's
19	250	Saxton's Own

Notes

• The following Strange items do not track kills, instead:
  • Mad Milk and Jarate tracks and ranks up based on the number of coated enemies, or "Sodden Victims".
  • The Wrench, Gunslinger, and Jag track Sentry Gun kills, whether Wrangled or not, and standard melee kills, and rank up based on Sentry Gun kills.
    • The Southern Hospitality only tracks standard melee kills.
  • The Medi Gun, Quick-Fix, and Kritzkrieg track ÜberCharges and kill assists;
    • The Medi Gun and Quick-Fix rank up based on ÜberCharges deployed.
    • The Kritzkrieg ranks up based on kill assists.
  • The Razorback tracks and ranks up based on the number of Spies shocked by backstabbing it, or "Spies Shocked".
  • The Dead Ringer tracks and ranks up based on number of feigned deaths.
• Killing a teammate while friendly fire is enabled will increase your kill total with that weapon by one, as though it were a normal kill.
• The following actions do not increase the total kill count:
  • Activating the Cloak of a Spy who is using the Dead Ringer.
  • Any action involving bots.
  • Killing yourself with a Strange weapon.
  • Killing an enemy with a compression blast.
  • Killing an enemy with a taunt. But Fencing kills will still increase the total kill count.
  • Activating the Dead Ringer via environmental damage, such as fall damage.
• Kills are counted together for classes that share the same Strange weapon.
• Using a Name Tag will change the name of the Strange weapon, but the weapon will still retain its rank and counter. Its current rank is displayed under the name of the weapon in light grey text.

Strange Parts

• In the March 22nd, 2012 Patch, Strange Parts were added to the game. They allow you to add on another counter to existing Strange weapons such as Heavies killed, headshots, buildings destroyed, projectiles reflected, airborne kills, and gib kills.

Bugs

• Counters do not update in-game when you inspect another player's Strange weapon on the Deathcam.
• If a Strange weapon goes up a rank, it will appear to have the original rank prefix when switching weapons until the player respawns.
• The Eyelander levels up only on kills, rather than total heads collected. Therefore killing someone with heads, such as another Demoman with the Eyelander (and all variants) or a Sniper with the Bazaar Bargain will only yield one kill.
• Killing yourself with the Wrangler while having one of Strange Wrenches equipped increases the counter.

Update history

June 23, 2011 Patch (Über Update)

• [Undocumented] Added Strange qualities.
• [Undocumented] Added Strange variants of the Chargin' Targe, Grenade Launcher, Stickybomb Launcher, Eyelander, Rocket Launcher, Pain Train, Shotgun, Direct Hit, Gloves of Running Urgently, Minigun, and Natascha.

June 28, 2011 Patch

• Fixed the problem that was causing Strange Demoman shields to not accumulate kills.

July 12, 2011 Patch [Item schema update]

• Added Strange variants of the Sandman, Pistol, Scattergun, Boston Basher, Ambassador, Conniver's Kunai, Knife, Revolver, Flamethrower, Flare Gun, Powerjack, and Backburner.

August 18, 2011 Patch

• [Undocumented] Added Strange variants of the Syringe Gun, Crusader's Crossbow, Bonesaw, Medi Gun, Sniper Rifle, Sydney Sleeper, Bushwacka, Jarate, Frontier Justice, Jag, and Wrench.

September 2, 2011 Patch

• Updated the Strange quality color from RGB [205, 155, 29] (#CD9B1D) to RGB [207, 106, 50] (#CF6A32).

September 20, 2011 Patch

• [Undocumented] Added Strange variants of the Axtinguisher, Black Box, and Razorback.
• [Undocumented] Added a "Spies Shocked" attribute for the Strange Razorback.
• [Undocumented] Added a "Heads Taken" attribute for the Strange Eyelander.

October 13, 2011 Patch

• When sorting the backpack, otherwise-equivalent items will sort by strange weapon rank and crate series number if possible.
• When selecting items from the loadout, weapons with different kill eater ranks will all show up.
• [Undocumented] Added Strange variants of the Ullapool Caber, Kritzkrieg, Holy Mackerel, Gunslinger, Machina, Mad Milk, Half-Zatoichi, Fists, and Degreaser.
• [Undocumented] Strange weapon ranking notifications no longer appear as a toast popup on screen.

October 25, 2011 Patch

• [Undocumented] Added Strange variants of the Brass Beast, Übersaw, L'Etranger, and Equalizer.

December 1, 2011 Patch

• [Undocumented] Added Strange variants of the Your Eternal Reward, Family Business, Soda Popper, Amputator, Reserve Shooter, Atomizer, Southern Hospitality, and Scottish Resistance.

December 15, 2011 Patch

• Added Festive weapons with the Strange quality attached.
• [Undocumented] Strange weapon level up alerts re-added for the player whose weapon leveled up.

December 21, 2011 Patch

• The Spirit Of Giving was added to the game.

January 11, 2012 Patch

• Fixed some cases where strange Ullapool Cabers and Wrenches would fail to correctly count kills.
• [Undocumented] Added Strange variants of the Bazaar Bargain, Big Earner, Blutsauger, and Liberty Launcher.

February 2, 2012 Patch

• [Undocumented] Added Strange variants of the SMG, Killing Gloves of Boxing, Quick-Fix, and Dead Ringer.

February 23, 2012 Patch

• [Undocumented] Added Strange variants of the Loch-n-Load and Overdose.

March 22, 2012 Patch

• Added strange parts.
• Fixed a bug that would cause chat-text strange weapon rank up notifications to sometimes display player names as "unknown"