Click on the name on the gravestone to get this: http://www.teamfortress.com/pumpkinp...epheniah_Mann/
Clicking "Barnabas Hale" on the Will gets you this: http://www.teamfortress.com/pumpkinp...mily_portrait/
EDIT: Here's the Will in text form:
So:
Zephaniah Mann was a businessman from (presumably) England, who was advised to go to America to expand his weapons company and buy vast gravel pits by his two sons. He also owned a tobacco plantation. He contracted many diseases and died.

The tobacco plantation was given to his maidservant Elizabeth.
Elizabeth looks like this picture of the Announcer (she is probably decended from her). Notice the cigarette.
http://tf2wiki.net/w/images/b/b4/Theannouncer.jpg
The weapons company (Mann & Sons Munitions Concern) was given to Barnabas Hale.
Barnabas strikes a great resemblance to his (obvious) decendant Saxton Hale. This also explains the name of Mann Co.

MOST IMPORTANTLY ALL HIS LAND WAS DIVIDED EVENLY BETWEEN HIS TWO SONS, BLUTARCH AND REDMOND.
The two teams in TF2 have their names explained...
Aparrently. Because we shouldn't forget Reliable Excavation Demolition and Builders' League United.
Also this is the reason we actually play this god-forsaken game, to fight over the land.

The final part has sand all over it though.
Zepheniah says he will leave the entirety of something to someone (possibly Spytech to round off all the fictional companies). EDIT: The guy on the right of the photograph is most likely the one Zephaniah is referencing, due to the fact both places are obscured with sand. A way to get us all excited. Thanks Valve.

EDIT:On cp_gravelpit there is an ammo box that comes up with this message when you try to pick it up:
It seems to be somewhat planned. Could cp_gravelpit be the start of Zephaniah's journey through America? This journey might be the mapcycle:

cp_gravelpit
cp_dustbowl
cp_granary
cp_well
ctf_2fort
tc_hydro
ctf_well
cp_badlands
pl_goldrush
cp_fastlane
ctf_turbine
pl_badwater
cp_steel
cp_egypt_final
cp_junction_final
plr_pipeline
pl_hoodoo_final
koth_sawmill
koth_nucleus
koth_viaduct
ctf_sawmill
cp_yukon_final
koth_harvest_final

If we look at the diseases they might be related to the maps.

OH MY GOD! Valve..you fucking amazing bastards!

It all makes sense now !

Omg, this actually makes sense!

this is amazing

Well it's not the greatest story ever, but it's okay.

I think that someone has got something here!

http://i37.tinypic.com/65sua8.jpg

Perhaps it's Elizabeth's time capsule. In the form of some ammunition.

How... unoriginal.

O_O

Links are dead

Is this update out yet? I can't tell.

No, VALVe said "later today".

Expect Ep3 first.

Actually, no...
BECAUSE GABE IS FAT
HAHAHA I DELAYED YOUR PRECIOUS EP3

I don't get it, what has the buried ammo crate do to do with it?

Oh yeah?

ROBIN IS FAT AND AUSTRALIAN.
HAHAHA I DELAYED YOUR PRECIOUS UPDATE

It's the treasure.

Here, someone wrote out the whole letter so its actually readable, update op with it.


I, Zephaniah Mann, being of sound mind, so hereby vow to haunt the earth as a horrifying poltergeist, until such time as I have quenched my all-consuming thirst for vengeance against he world, and especially against my dunderhead sons.
If it takes a brave man to admit he is in error, then surely a man willing to admit both of his sons are stumble-bum muttonheads is twice as brave. It was they who convinced me to spend the entirety of my sizeable fortune purchasing land in the unclaimed frontier of the Americas, in the hope of expanding our weapons concern to the uncolonized westernmost regions. Many tales did they whisper in my too credulous ears, of gravel as far as the eye can see, for any man with strong back and iron spirit to harness. Long did I dream of transforming these virgin lands, and its vast holes, into the worlds most majestic and profitable pits of gravel. But when at last we arrived, we only found "fool's gravel" -- my nitwit sons had purchased a continent-sized parcel of sand! It is here in this wind-swept desert hell that I fear I shall breathe my last.
Since moving from my Cambridgeshire estate to the untamed frontier I have contracted putrid fever, bilious fever, blackwater fever, green fever, spotted fever -- even womb fever, as a complication from a serious bout of superfluous uterus. On our sailing trip to the new world I contracted white plague, marasmus, sweating sickness, deplumatious tumors of the eyelids, pleurisy membranous croup and scarlet rash; during the drive west I contracted brain itch, stomatitus, and blood poisoning; since settling our estate I have contracted falling sickness, walking sickness, stationary sickness, shingles, jaundiced spine and skull bloat. I contracted scirvener's palsy in the writing of this last will & testament. Possessing no paper in this godforsaken frontier, I have penned this on my own skin, which has sloughed off in quantity since contracting impetigo.

To the foul-smelling, uneducated simpletons of the untamed Americas, I leave only this curse -- as weapons have caused my downfall, so will it engineer the downfall of any soul who puts one to use near my restless grave. Shoot over my bones, and I shall visit upon you a haunting the likes of which you have never seen.
To my dearest maidservant Elizabeth I leave the rest and residue of my estate -- including all deeds, accounts, debts public and private -- my tobacco plantation -- and what remains of the fortune my addle-pated sons have squandered. Find the gravel that I was unable to find! Honor me by placing it inside a pit!
To my faithful aide and tracker, Barmabas Hale of the savage Australias, I divest complete control of the Mann & Sons Munitions Concern. You procured the poppy flowers required for the medicines that gave me succor from the pains of my many warring ailments. It has been pleasant to not shriek myself to sleep.
To my layabout, brain defective sons, Blutarch and Redmond, I leave the greatest curse of all -- partnership. What land I have purchased in this new world is to be split evenly between you both. You have wasted your lives bickering over nothing and so I leave you dimwits something of consequence over which to feed.
Lastly, to [obscured text due to sand] I leave the entirety of my [obscured text due to sand] and swear you to utmost secrecy in its keeping.
God and His angels will have to drag me screaming to Heaven. I do not want to die! Damn you all to hell!

Zephaniah Mann

THANKS BRO.
Will update.

I love Valve, they ''just'' released the L4D2 demo and all attention is on L4D2 for about a day and they turn it around like this and makes us pay attention to TF2.

Valve<33

What? How.. That.. It ... Perfect sense.

I wonder if they ever sleep. I don't think this sorta development cycle can be sustained without closing your eyes for an hour.

I'm lurking my thread because my ego shoots up 100% when I see a new post

VALVe's business ethos is something along the lines of "We sleep when the Europeans don't".

So THAT'S why...
Thanks Tentacle. That helps me understand Valve so much now.

Poor guard dog....

VALVe just loved the Guard Dog thing to death.

Edited:

OH MY GOD THAT lS SOMETHING MY REDNECK AUNT WOULD SAY OH GOD OH GOD PLEASE JESUS GOD NO.

I want to know who that man on the right side of the photo was, I'd assumed the citizen or his ancestor.

Edited:

That, or dracula, for no reason. Could always be the spy's father too.

She probably recorded her voice to the computer, which makes sense

The entirety of something to someone?

Could this be the person whom we can only partly see on the right end of the photograph?

Can you imagine the old TF2 that was based only on fight of two companies?

Ye Olde TF2... I can't imagine what the classes and guns would be like. :O

Also, what happened to the guard dog? Did I miss something? Rate me books.

Okay, now I've got over how much more information Valve has given us, I'm now thinking about where this will actually go. Is it just a story to amuse us and give us a bit more backstory, or is this somehow going to be implemented into the game. It already sort of is, with the ammo at Gravelpit C (does it spin like normal, or does it just look static?) Will we be able to 'use' it one day, and enter a code? Who knows?
Does anyone else think this is like the big San Andreas 'easter egg' that was never found (and probably never existed), the Epsilon haven? Something to do with a dented truck, wearing a black suit and a cane.
It just gets me excited :D

Edited:

That was fan made.

Amazing! Thanks OP.

The ammo pack at C doesn't spin, there is also an ammo pack at point A underneath the ground near the point and a small health pack under the ground from the C door entrance to A, you can pick all these up but you have to noclip to get to them of course :)

The OP just blew my mind.

I'm aware of that. But some people were mentioning how the dog had died or something like that. :o

This...
is...

AWESOME

.

See those two men next to the bed. RED and BLU's founders. Look at there coats.

Since everyone is wondering about the person on the right, I'm gonna assume that's SpyTech's founder.
I'm going to put that in to my post.

My ego+ 1000%

Whilst walking over and shooting at the ammo pack on Gravel Pit (underground at C). Where I presume his grave is, metal was randomly been given to me and taken away without me building any buildables.
http://i36.tinypic.com/f3er5u.jpghttp://i33.tinypic.com/91a3cl.jpghttp://i35.tinypic.com/2rpuq6t.jpghttp://i34.tinypic.com/2444aco.jpgThe metal wasn't popping up as fast as it usually would it was slowly rising up.

I love Valve...

The TF2 map rotation has changed. CP_Dustbowl is no longer the default map on server startup, it has been changed to CP_Gravelpit and the final map is KOTH_Harvest.

The two sons look a tiny bit like the TFC Civilian.

Strange. Very strange.

So there's some new info...

Yes, cp_gravelpit is definitely involved in this. Can you post the whole map rotation? It might be the jouney of Zephaniah's life.

Cool.

This

Great thread, I really love it when games have a backstory like this.

If there's ever a TF3, I can see it being a classic version of what it is now. The Red and Blu guys fighting when they were younger. Valve definatly seem to be going in that direction, with all the late victorian/early 1900s easter eggs and styles.

Hmm, next game would be Scout's Real Father, because just cuz the spy fucked his mom doesn't exactly mean it is his baby.
The Heavy would have hair
The spy would have less of a mask.
The Medic would be younger
The engineer would be replaced by another engineer with a different style.
the Sniper would have a mullet and be more of a punk.
The demoman would have a Kanye West thing going on with his hair, he would also have 2 eyes.
The pyro would have a different mask.
And there would be civilian mode
I can already hear the vocals for that mode

"Saved ya ass bub."
- The Sniper.

Hahaha, I love valve.

Valve is amazing

This is like a murder mystery with more murder :D

If what you said happened:

1800-----------------------------------------------------Present--------------------------------------------Year 3000

--------------------TF3----------------TF2-----------------------------------TFC--------------------------------------

The series would move backwards with each new release. If n was the number of release and t was chronological progression (not actual years), that would be:
n=-t

TF3 in 1861-1865?

More interesting is that valve did probably research all this stuff before making the final version of the game

Eventually it would be cavemen fighting with clubs and bows and arrows.

Edited:

I doubt it, I think they are just improvising as they go along.

What's wrong with arrows? Go ask the dinosaurs about how effective they were.

Wouldn't be so different then.

THIS IS A SMALL AND FUNNY IMAGE SO I WILL NOT BE USING MEDIA TAGS.
EDIT: GODDAMMIT SHIBBEY I WAS LATE AGAIN

I assume that Zephaniah Mann is on the BLU team? Or is there a red version of him aswell? I think it's really fucking cool when I run through one of those houses, then the lights turn out and a ghost comes out the freaking wall.
First time it happened to me I was like "HOLY SHIT!" I then got killed by a medic, who dominated me and got a Ghastly Gibus hat, lucky him. I personally used the achievement unlocker to get both the hats.

In the GCF's there are 2 files of interest for maps

maplists
and this is slightly more relavent
mapcycle
Not sure what to make of it but I am pretty sure that the top one is what the rotation used to be like and the bottom one is what it is at the moment

Less effective then meteors apparently though.

Thanks Vazzan. I'll add that shit.

This is the kind of stuff that makes me love Valve.

Something that I have been playing around with in my head is the fact that maybe the Will of Z.M hasn't been found yet, for example BLU and RED could be trying to find their father's will so that his land can be shared between them.
It's a bit of a long shot but I'm putting it here so that if it becomes true I have proof that I was thinking it all along!

Good idea Vazzan. AND EVERYONE CHECK OUT THE EDIT, IT MIGHT INTEREST SOME OF YOU GUYS.

Possibly Badwater? I dunno, I'm just grasping at straws here.

OH MY GOD GUYS

Wow, Valve is officially the greatest game company. They make a no story DM game and it starts to evolve to a whole story

It's a conspiracy, the cavemen Bow and Arrow'd them to death, Saxton wouldn't lie.

Duh, Z.M = Zombie Master

holy shit TF2 is deeep

In the family photo, the guy on the far left resembles Saxton Hale, and the dog appears similar to the "Guard-Dog." Hmm...

They are trying to find their fathers will by killing each other?

I'd have thought they're looking for the will because they think their father left the whole estate to either one or the other. They think that by finding it, they can prove once and for all who the land belongs to.

Yes, the less people you get to share the money with, the more money you get.

cp_gravelpit
cp_dustbowl
cp_granary
cp_well
ctf_2fort
tc_hydro
ctf_well
cp_badlands
pl_goldrush
cp_fastlane
ctf_turbine
pl_badwater
cp_steel
cp_egypt_final
cp_junction_final
plr_pipeline
pl_hoodoo_final
koth_sawmill
koth_nucleus
koth_viaduct
ctf_sawmill
cp_yukon_final
koth_harvest_final

i think we should go in the maps, different people in different maps, and find stuff, like the secret room in harvest_final, or look for more stuff relating to this like the underground ammo box, the random increase and decrease in metal.

Personally, i think the decrease and increase is like a " guide " sort of like " warmer " - more metal- and " colder " - metal taken away-
i don't know, it's just my opinion

Holy shit

WUT

-- as weapons have caused my downfall, so will it engineer the downfall of any soul who puts one to use near my restless grave. Shoot over my bones, and I shall visit upon you a haunting the likes of which you have never seen.

what the hell does this mean?