Item drop system

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— The Heavy

”

The item drop system is the system where players can obtain weapons, hats, or Miscellaneous items through playtime and achievement progress in Team Fortress 2. It was first introduced with the Sniper vs. Spy Update.

History

Former system

While keeping the Achievement Milestones already present for the Scout, Pyro, Heavy and Medic, Valve implemented the random drop system to maintain class balance in the event of a class update. This system was patched into the game as part of the Sniper vs. Spy Update.

Valve calculated the average time a regular Team Fortress 2 player played, then came up with an unknown time which was used as a marker or set point. Every time a player had played for 25 minutes, the game randomly drew a decision for the player. If the player was lucky (25% per item chance) then they would get a randomly chosen weapon or hat. If the player was unlucky, then they would have received no item that time. There was a separate timer that counted every 15,430 seconds (4 hours, 17 minutes, and 10 seconds) you had an additional 1 in 28 chance of receiving a hat. The average time for getting a single item was 1h 40min (including duplicates). Since weapons were granted via a random number generator, experience varied.

When first released, item drops would only occur if players were connected to the Steam Community. If a player was not signed into his or her friends list, or if Valve was performing maintenance on the Steam Community, the player would not receive item drops during that time. Valve changed this system at a later date, and item drops now occur for those who are not signed into the Steam Community.

Current system

On April 20, 2010, the item drop system was changed.^[1] Instead of rolling randomly at intervals to see if you got an item drop, the system rolls to determine when your next item drop will occur. With this change, players are guaranteed to find items at regular intervals. Under the previous system players could have unlucky streaks, where they didn't find any items for long periods of time. The new system has removed this possibility. The drop rate was also increased, however players have a limited amount of playtime per week when they can receive drops. Playing beyond that amount won't find any more items but unused time rolls over to the following week.

The maximum amount of items you can get is not known, however it can't exceed 56 because the day drop limit is 8. On average a player gets ~6 items a week. ^[2] The system resets each player's item drop count around each Wednesday, Pacific standard time where Valve is located.

The dropped items are stored in the backpack after the player's death, after a trade has been done or if the Mann Co. Store is visited.

Achievement Milestones

On April 29, 2008, Valve unveiled a set of three unlockable weapons as part of their Gold Rush Update. These weapons were unlocked by completing a set number of achievements, resulting in an achievement milestone. There were three achievement milestones in all, with each successive one requiring more achievements. Once each milestone was unlocked the player received the set weapon that came with that achievement milestone. This requirement was subsequently reduced to stop players grinding just to get the new unlocks.

On May 21, 2009, Valve implemented a new system of random drops for unlockable items and discontinued the milestone system. Valve soon fell back to the Achievement Milestones coupled with the item drop system for the Sniper and Spy weapons in the the May 29, 2009 Patch. This milestone system has since been used in the WAR! Update and also appeared in the Engineer update.

Advantages and disadvantages

A positive aspect of the system is that it allows new and old players alike to earn unlockable weapons by investing play time. It allows players to play as any class, since as long as they are racking up game-time, the player is eligible for an item drop.

Many players received unwanted duplicates. This was dealt with by the introduction of the Crafting system, and later by the Trading system, allowing players to trade all but a few items with each other.

^[3]

Despite the new systems, Idling still exists. However, it is now possible using the offline mode (use of the -textmode game launch parameter combined with -novid and -nosound to disable video and audio processing respectively,) leaving server providers free to provide a gaming experience.

Backpack

File:Backpack.jpg

The backpack screen showing the spots where items are stored.

The backpack is where dropped items are stored, and can be used by players to equip items for play in the Loadout menu. The backpack has a limited capacity of 200 slots, so it may be necessary to destroy or craft duplicates in order to make room for new weapons or items. The capacity was originally a single page that stored 50 items. The capacity was doubled to 2 pages, a capacity of 100 items, on September 15, 2009. It was doubled again to 4 pages, a capacity of 200 items, on September 30, 2010 with the release of the Mann-Conomy update.