stupid rule finally done with, maybe there will be amazing highlander teams.

I've heard this rumor too...I think the original intent was to keep platinum HL from just being an invite player dick sucking contest. Whichever team had the most invite players would just out dm the teams they played against.

so?

what's wrong with the teams having the most invite players out-dming the other team?

do me a favor

replace the word "invite" with "really good" in your post, then reread it

Makes sense. Why let a team made up of better players win? Force teams to not have too many good players and you've got yourselves a match/league!

uhhh....calm down, there's nothing wrong with one team having better players beating the other team, the original purpose of the rule was to keep teams from just trying to stack invite players, that's all I said, did you ever watch a HL match when b4nny and cyzer played?

You mean to say that the intent was to prevent too many good players from stacking a team? I can see how that would just be unfair to the teams without good players.

yeah, they still lost

god forbid people stack good players in a competitive game

people are making the mistake of thinking I'm defending the rule, I'm just stating it's original intent, it really DOES just boil down to "you guys are too good go away you can't play with us it's not fair", I also think the rule is stupid

I'm torn on this one. The very idea of having a limit on good players is downright stupid obviously. Removing this cap will definitely make the HL scene so much more interesting to follow since the skill cap will raise exponentially, but without it, I'm worried about a team full of invite level players downright rolling all over every team they play against. If a team has 9 invite players they could probably scrim once a week and still roll over half of the teams in platinum. The best solution I can think of is a new league that's a step above platinum and the invite players can form full teams and play against each other there.

Or maybe the challenge of beating a juggernaut team full of invite players will actually fuel the platinum scene further and makes things even more interesting to follow/spectate. Can't exactly predict the future. This is just how I'm looking at things.

#9: There's nothing wrong with stacking good players in a competitive environment but UGC HL isn't exactly played for huge cash prizes and you need to think about HL as a spectator sport. It may not be as interesting to follow the platinum scene (currently the only HL league worth following imo) if there's one supercharged team that's just eating the entire league's lineup alive.

Never heard of a top competitive league banning a team because they were better than other teams in any sport or game. Yeah you could have an invite HL league but it'd be less than 4 teams more than likely. I don't get why you should feel afraid of better players in the pool. You're completely denying the point of competitive play. If platinum is the top league, why aren't they playing against the best teams? It's ridiculous that the rule could ever be in place, and it basically bans players from competing (assume every invite team has 7 players, 8x7=56 players, 16x3=48 players, well fuck those 8 players you guys are banned). Honestly whoever was in favor of the rule should go back to pubs if they don't want competition.

Invite players? Finally we'll have some decent medics.

Ultimately I'm happy to see the rule removed. Like I said, it exponentially increases the skill cap and that's obviously a good thing. I'm just worried about plat HL's spectator scene. If competition remains tight, then that's great. If every finals match is just invite team vs invite team then season turnouts will just be kinda predictable.

It's not that I think the rule is any good; I'm just skeptical about the implications this cap removal will have on HL as a spectator e-sport.

if teams in platinum are worried about being rolled by the invite teams, they can just move down a division

I don't get this super entitled attitude where teams want to like have their cake and eat it too- want to be placed with almost no effort on their part into the highest, most prestigious division, and also want to guarantee they don't get wrecked in that division by better teams.

plus, the top few hl teams roll lower plat anyways

You guys are acting like UGC platinum is full of kiddies who don't want their precious first place titles to be threatened. We were the ones who asked and pushed for the limit to be removed after all. In fact you'd be hard pressed to find someone who actually thinks the rule should be upheld. But whatever. I'm curious to see which, if any, invite players actually make teams.

Going on the hypothetical that the rule would be removed. The esea and ugc seasons are overlapping. Would the league even see an amazing all invite team? Wouldn't invite players be doing invite things and too busy for this highlander nonsense. IMHO, it would be/is pretty boring (not to mention annoying) as a spectator to have a team full of invite players ffl matches or ride bench until playoffs, after they meet the qualifying criteria.

Altogether, The top level of highlander is amazing to watch, and will continue to be regardless of the invite rule. Though, I personally think that invite players should not overcommit themselves to 2 leagues if they can't play the full season.

The admins who decided the rule was dumb. The HL people I've pugged with never seemed to support the rule. Who even came up with it though, that's the problem.

In my experience, this is exactly how the league is...

This is the exact reason why I was banned in Season 5, some raging kid that couldn't handle losing to a team built of good players.

Most invite teams scrim late, at around 10:15-10:30PM EST.

this isn't really true... i guarantee those teams might have better soldiers scouts and demos but the majority of the off classes will be more than balanced. more then likely they would be recruiting 24/7 HL players to fill those roles.

the core 6s classes, besides medic of course, are the primary fragging classes, that's why they're the core of 6s, you put b4nny on demo, ruwin on scout, oplaid on heavy, TLR on soldier, all on the same HL team, then the engies, spies, pyros, etc.(on both teams) just don't matter any more no matter who they are

that's not true

I don't think I can get behind this. Throw enigma on pyro, any invite player on heavy, and most invite scouts/mackey on sniper. You've already got a pretty amazing utility lineup there. The heavy and sniper might have to get used to the enemy team running a full time spy but I don't think that would be an obstacle for too long.

The utilities certainly matter but pyro/heavy/engie aren't super hard to play and amazing snipers aren't exactly uncommon in the invite scene.

More than likely they'd fill the remaining slots with their friends. Not every (or most, not sure honestly) invite player wants to play HL anyways.

There may have been a point where having that rule served a good purpose. But I think it's about time it's gone.

May your wish be granted..

http://www.ugcleague.com/forums/showthread.php?t=12017

Awesome. I don't mind the limit on invite players in lower leagues since it's stacking a free league for no reason, so long as 4+ invite players can be promoted to plat right away.

grrrrreat.

This neXt season might be a little bit crazy. I hope that most of the traditional Highlander platinum teams that have been around for a while, stay together instead of cannibalizing their rosters, even if it means dropping down to Silver the season after this one. Keep on playing and focusing on your skills, and there is no reason why those same HL teams cant come back and beat up on Invite 6s players.

Just met Hein at Quakecon. The reason you were banned was for refusing to provide your POV demo on three separate occasions. You could have just given them the POV demo and probably been fine.