i don't think that there is anything uniquely wrong with a pay model for higher divisions in a new UGC 6s division.

paying for esea felt like (and largely was) giving to a terrible, soulless machine that fucked you over with terrible servers and bad service.

there should be a free division, of course, but equivalents to the skill levels of the majority of open-invite should require at least a once a season fee. not the $60 invite league fee or any bullshit like that, just $5 or $10 to go into running the league and keeping it competitive.

PYYYOUR please make CEVO happen

A season or two into it would probably go over better. I don't know that a lot of people are just gonna drop ESEA and pay into another brand new league. Whichever league ends up with the most players is the one that's gonna come out on top, and a fee alienates a lot of players

It's not a divide between invite and the other divs. It's a divide between UGC and ESEA. Every single player playing ESEA over UGC chooses the poorly run/evil/overpriced league with LAN.

I would love to see the community turn this energy and make an awesome league out of it. But nothing is going to happen unless you all get over the idiotic blind rage at ESEA and stop declaring yourselves against every single thing ESEA has to offer, even if it's vital to a successful competitive league.

None of you would be playing in ESEA if it didn't have prize pots and a LAN. Stop pretending you'd play in a free league when there's an alternative with prizes.

How many fucking times have we done this? ESEA does something stupid and everyone gets mad and then circlejerks in a thread about how they should get a new league because they certainly aren't in it for the check and anyone that is must be an ESEA loving scumbag and why haven't we already made our own?

Surprise guys, money has a greater impact on the game than what a handful of players in each div get in their mail each month. Money means commitment and competition, and that's what we play for. LAN is the pinnacle each player strives towards. Without these things you get UGC, which you all obviously aren't satisfied with.

Minus frag away

CEVO is a great option and maybe easily doable, phipher mentioned bigger prize and more divisions if there were more teams, but I feel we would benefit more in the long run from a community run league and not a business. And for that we have 3 options.

UGC, a apparently well-run league, very popular amongst the HL playerbase
ETF2L, established for years as the main european league, it works very well I would say, admins are very active, actually you can just go on IRC and query and admin and I guarantee you that 90% of the time you'll get a response and see your issue solved in 5-10 mins, the support is near perfect.
And we got a possible new community run league, which honestly looks like a long shot to take, because it would just be a massive amount of work to start a league from the ground up, well if a community run tf.tv league was to emerge it would be a good option Im sure, but it seems very unlikely this 3rd option is ever gonna happen.

Personally,I don't think UGC's structure is the ideal for this. Also I honestly am not feeling the site at all, it's such a horrible experience ever since I started using it from the first time. And Tf.tv or another new community league is highly unlikely so IMO those options would be out for me.

That brings it to CEVO or ETF2L, as I said before both look like a great option but I think we would benefit more from a community run league than a business that might try and screw us over in the long run. Also, if we have a new etf2l with a NA division that would almost make it a worldwide community run league, it might just finally get valve attention. So I am inclined to go with ETF2L here, not just because I already play there, but I think it's run by people who are genuinely interested in our scene and have more than once shown their good will towards us. This brings me to another topic which is the etf2l site which I feel it's not good either, not terrible like UGC's but definitely very outdated, if we could get some fresh coders and talent on board we might make it one of the best leagues ever.

I beleive you guys are fighting more over which league has a LAN instead of focusing on the fact that ESEA backdoor'd every single computer that installed the client. If your willing to have all your information leeched into the moneyhungry E$EA's already gargantuan database, power to you.
I'll be looking forward to getting shit on in CEVO next season, met alot of people and got alot of opinions that i value greatly.

I have never played a season of ESEA with any sort of monetary goal in mind. You're completely wrong if you think that most people play ESEA for a check and not so that they can prove that they are the best in their division.

???

Didn't know you spoke for everyone in ESEA including open/im/main players.

ESEA has a much more developed 6s scene than UGC, and gets a lot of exposure as the most competitive league in North America. Anyone wanting to move up through the divisions and play the strongest teams will choose ESEA over UGC, simply because there is much more competition to be had in high open and beyond than any division of UGC 6s.

This network effect is what keeps ESEA popular: they have all the best teams and a more developed scene than anyone else right now, and if you want to play against those teams you're forced to sign up for ESEA. It's very hard to split a userbase like that unless alternative leagues offer some huge advantage over ESEA that absolutely everyone is concerned with.

But I don't think that.

That would be why I wrote this:

Money is the reason everyone chooses to play ESEA over UGC. Pretending otherwise is stupid.

I try to play in ESEA because UGC has a lower skill level than ESEA. I've been here for a couple seasons though so I'm not the best example I guess

No one is against what ESEA has to offer. They just hate that they aren't focused on TF2 and that they tried to NSA people.

Half of the invite and Main teams would actually lose less money each season in a free league, so they'd probably want to play in a free league with the same skill divide as ESEA. Playing ESEA for the money/prizes is retarded because the time/reward ratio is ridiculously skewed. It's so much more efficient to just get a job and pub TF2 more if you want to just get cool stuff and play video games

This is probably going to fizzle out in about 5 days, which is gonna suck. But one day maybe we can get a better league going, and if nothing else it might hopefully pique the interest of UGC/CEVO/ETF2L. If enough players started to jump ship to other leagues, even if it was only 20-30% of upper level teams, we'd see a dramatic divide in the community that could snowball into everyone leaving ESEA. Most people don't really give a shit what league they're in, they just want to get out of ESEA

Money may be a huge motivator, and it definitely is a huge reason that some people bother to finish seasons, it isn't like ESEA is the only league that could charge money for playing.

Um no, I like ESEA because I get to scrim 5-6 nights a week, compared to the usual 2-3 of a UGC team. Money is a non-issue in Open, and Main is the only Div where money can really be made. I doubt many people started playing TF2 3 years ago with the intent of joining the then nonexistent second highest div and pocketing $100 every 4 months

Let me toss this idea out there:

Since we're obviously not all going to be on the same page regarding which league to support, how about this: We form a committee to track the progress of each involved league, this committee would be responsible for judging the comparative skill levels of the players. And at the end of each season (assuming 3 seasons in a year), this committee selects the best team of each league in that season and invites them to an end-of-year World Championship LAN.

The idea being both to reduce the financial requirement on teams and organizers by hosting only the 1 Big LAN as opposed to three little ones, and to generate more interest by being able to bring together more teams to compete for the title.

Of course, since I'm bringing it up I am willing to work to make it happen, or any other solution that we decide on.

It's way more than just this. Unless you have experience, you absolutely cannot say the reasons why people play ESEA. The best people hope for when attending LAN is to break even. The more correct answer is there's a certain standard associated with ESEA that causes teams to prove themselves against each other. It is seen as the highest standard of competition, and is played in the same manner. Even if there were a different jumpstart league that iT and mix both played, a mix^ win in the "TeamFortressTV Tournament" carries far less clout and is taken much less seriously.

Money is certainly a motivating factor, but at the end of the day is overlooked for competition. The reason Platinum plays the game season after season is not to earn extra money from TF2 that he doesn't already earn from his regular job (like, what?). It's to win. Everything has always been to win.

Money is powerful but I'm PRETTY SURE people still play the husk that was once TF2 purely because they like playing 6s. Although recently people have been making me question otherwise.

Every single person is here because of the money. That doesn't mean they're here FOR the money.

It goes like this:

A paid league attracts hardcore players who want the commitment a monetary obligation includes, and the competition a prize pot induces.

The competition causes players to excel at the game, which grants prestige to the league they're playing in. "Look at how good our players are."

Other players become aware of the prestige (usually through the hardcore players), and players who don't value the monetary commitment or prize pot as much start playing.

Now a hierarchy is established, and with it a strong identity for the league independent from the hardcore players who helped forge it.

Now anyone who wants to play competitive tf2 knows to go to ESEA, because that's where everyone else plays.

Money is a catalyst that creates a social gravitational pull, creating an entity starting with the densest (most committed) cliques and groups, and increases in size and strength to absorb more and more distant groups.

Does this make my point more clear?

Most of us aren't here for the money, but we're still here because of it. If you want to create a league to rival ESEA, it's not possible without matching the prize pots and LANs.

i just wanna game man.....

people still play this shit game in esea lmao

I understood your point the first time, but the goal for a separate league isn't to exceed or even match ESEA's prize pool. It's really just the LAN that creates that standard. i46's prize pool was "alright," and when attending, teams understood they were making maybe $150 per person if they won (due to paying eXtv), but was still regarded as possibly the most hyped, competitive atmosphere TF2 has seen. Honestly, a league could have a prize pool lower than ESEA's, but it's the LAN that really sells it. Having different setups, including monitors, computer hardware, and desk space actually make an enormous difference. More of a difference than what most people think. Having a method by which players compete on equal playing field is desired the most I would say. Having even 75% of a prize pot in a different league while offering LAN would be just as desirable, especially if it means leaving ESEA in the dust.

I do agree however that UGC is handicapped by lack of prize pot.

I know it's the LAN that matters, but everyone in this thread is busy pretending that LAN doesn't affect them in any way at all so they can yell about new leagues without actually thinking about what it entails, so I'm trying to make it understandable for everyone. Plus when you get down to it, LAN is just money in a different form, and a lot of it.

I think LAN (or the equivalent) is a prerequisite to even starting a new league. You can't build up to one without establishing a playerbase, and you can't establish a playerbase without one while an alternative like ESEA exists.

I chose esea in the past because:
- I don't want to be the best in the league and equivalent to mid-high open teams.
- I don't want to have 1/3 of my games be ffws.
- I want to play with my friends.

The money is shit either way; I'm not gonna make a living off this shit. All of these problems with other leagues will be ameliorated via the changes that UGC seems to be willing to make combined with the predominant transfer of the community to another league.

If you read the post following that one, you'll see that your three reasons are still the result of the money.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=71TJnRSf7HI

Your point is that money brings all of these things, my point is that, despite these things being derivatives of money, they are not uniquely derived from money.

AND the volume of money is insignificant to the generation my my ends. Beyond a certain level, you do not gain competition or seriousness by increasing the buy in. If leagues like UGC step up with a separate paid league (as they seem to be willing to do) we can create all the benefits of esea sans many if the negatives.

e: grammar

Alright so you're defending ESEA essentially after all the shit they've put you through and after your ex-team has been bashing them since this start of the season ?

Doesn't that seem slightly hypocritical to you ?

We have the players, we have the community, we have the means and the will, fuck ESEA.

If players want a LAN we can organize a community driven one, if players want a prize-pool we can buy in and have a payment system setup.

Anything is possible, we have smart dedicated community-driven people who play this game, if you don't think we can rise above the cesspool that is ESEA and still have good competition at a top level you're wrong.

Here's the way I look at it:

Choose ESEA if you want a LAN, choose UGC/CEVO if you want quality.

Nice response to my question Lpkane

http://play.esea.net/index.php?s=news&d=comments&id=13341&find_comment_number=255#n255

clockwork is just pointing some things out about people's perspectives.

I believe that while it might take a bit, we can have a full funded community LAN eventually with qualifying teams having travel paid for. Fully funded travel and 6 trophies with no prize money would be better than the current ESEA structure in my opinion.

You are still assuming that what you say is true and the opinion of ESEA players. So far everyone here has stated youthe opposite. You are wrong.

I'm pretty sure there would be a lot of tftv helpers like Fog or Marxist who would be willing to commit serious backing to a tftv league, along with Klare, Nahanni, and the buds.

I think it's time to stop saying "let's have other people take care of it"

this is almost the same as when the forums were split between tftv and natf2. The community is going to be split but something has to happen and either all of the top teams need to move and bring everyone else with them or tf2 has to be removed from esea. I don't see the latter happening