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They originally quickbanned using this for mediguns, but now it applies to all weapons. Personally I think it should only be restricted to mediguns, since it'd be pretty meta to win a roamer fight against a black box user and then take it from him. That's pretty much the only place it can really change anything, and it's not game breaking.

They need to ban loose cannon, not this mechanic.

Unrelated, but ESEA rules really need some cleaning up, especially the TF2-specific section.

seems unnecessary, I don't see the problem with picking up a gun for ammo or switching your black box for a rl

Is this a mid-season change? If so I disagree with it ideologically: nothing has changed since the update that introduced the mechanic so if this was going to be policy it should have been implemented before the season started. Unless there was a case of this being somehow exploited.

Banning everything could come from the fact that there is a Source Mod command to disable pickups, but it applies to all weapons rather than just mediguns. However, this argument would be useless if ESEA hasn't bothered to enable that command on their servers.

Sourcemod isn't required for tf_dropped_weapon_lifetime 0.

I don't like what ESEA is doing. Instead of looking at what's affected and actually opening up discussion they cop out. Take the easy route and stalemate the metagame. It's fine when after arguments from both sides of the matter a conclusion is drawn, but this just shows that they want to avoid spending time and just host a quick season and take their subscribers money.

At this point I'm setting up our next season on ETF2L, and we're discussing unlocks and the pickups. Even if we decide to ban item/medigun pickups again, we will know the actual pros and cons of it. It would be wise for ESEA players to ask the staff why they haven't even began looking into something this big of an influence to the game.

Honestly I assume they are just doing this so they don't have to police individual cases and can just turn off picking up dropped weapons

tf_dropped_weapon_lifetime is a client var, not a server var. The only way to enforce it for every connected client is to use a plugin like Sourcemod.

Weapon pickups don't belong to 6v6, simple as that. A 1v1 shouldn't be decided on who picked up a fully loaded weapon from the ground to replenish all ammo. I used to hold last with two rocket launchers on Badlands (the second rl was gifted from a roamer who bombed our medic), one for spamming into top lobby, and a reserve one lying on the ground for a real fight, so I effectively had 8 rockets. Can't imagine that being fun to play against, and I wouldn't want to play against a scout with 12 loaded scattergun shots or a demo with 16 loaded stickies. Also, weapon pickups completely removes any ammo management skills since you can often just pick up a new rocket launcher when you are low on ammo.

This argument is moot because usually with a dropped weapon is a dropped ammo box.

That is more like abusing a weapon, to get that extra clip. This I can agree with being game changing. However, the clip would only be 1-3 rockets, I doubt a bomb would leave it with a full clip. And even then, you're gonna have to reload 8 rockets. Sounds abusable in theory, but there are key timings to abusing this that make you vulnerable.

Again, this worry seems mostly in theory. The pickup system can only slightly be a game changer, it takes time to stop and pick up the scattergun by which time you can have all shots reloaded, and you're not gonna have the luxury to pick it up mid-fight. Demomen can abuse this better, assuming they use at least 80% of their clip to get a kill, and assuming the killed demoman (not from a trap but from a team fight or otherwise) will have NOT used half of their clip as well, so really the point about getting extra clip is very situational where getting that instant replenish made you win a fight. And even if you did switch weapons quickly enough to have more in the clip to quickly fight something, I think it'd be pretty cool if you could pull it off knowing 5 stickies are better than the remaining 1 (and also assuming you don't just switch to your grenade launcher to fight)

ALSO, does changing stickybomb launchers destroy sticky traps?? I feel like it would, even if it's just to another stock launcher.

Again, moot point because typically weapons are found with ammo boxes. The only benefit is after a long fight, if you killed someone against the wall at granary for example, and the ammo box was picked up by another enemy/teammate, or the fight went long and it despawned, then you have the opportunity to pick up the weapon for a small ammo reserve gain--again, sort of moot when you consider there are plenty of ammo reserves in most areas of most maps.

I am talking about the loaded ammo that likely will be in the dropped ammo. Picking up ammo boxes does not replenish loaded ammo, unlike actually picking up the weapon itself.

You can pick up the rocket launcher, load all the ammo, and then pick up your other rocket launcher again. So you can basically switch between the rocket launchers as you wish as long as you do not wait more than 30 seconds because then the other rocket launcher despawns. And yes, this is viable because you don't really have to worry about the ammo in the rocket launcher you are spamming with because you are going to fight with the rocket launcher on the ground. You are most likely not going to reload 8 rockets mid fight anyway.

It's not a worry "mostly in theory". I have actually played with weapon pick ups allowed in a lot of officials during the razer cups. I have abused it this way myself, I know it works, you don't need to tell me that it's mostly theoretical because it is not.

Picking up a weapon does take a bit of time but it is way faster than reloading yourself. Sure, the weapon might be empty in loaded clips but it is still worth the gamble in some situations. This is really unpredictable and random, you can't know how much ammo a dropped weapon has unless you killed the guy yourself a lot of the times. This is just another argument to ban weapon pickups.

My last point is not moot because 1) the rocket launcher has slower despawn than the ammo pack dropped from the weapon, 2) someone else might have already taken the ammopack, 3) you can pick up the rocket launcher first and then the ammopack and you will most likely have more ammo than if you just picked up the ammobox.

Also, you can reload weapons that are lying on the ground and then pick up your loaded gun again, and abuse the fact that you know there is a fully loaded weapon on the ground, and you will effectively have two loaded weapons.

EDIT: Just going to add, I was VERY open towards the weapon picking up mechanic initially, but after having playtested it in several cups and tournaments, in both Highlander and 6v6, I have come to the conclusion that it's not a good mechanic. It's not something I am against because it is new or changes the game, this is a conclusion that I came up with AFTER playtesting it.

razer cups allow weapon pickups? has anyone messaged one of the admins to tell them about how retarded the pickups are and to ban them?

Not anymore, it was only in the first few razer cups you could pick up weapons.

I wanted to pick up australium weapons because I'm too poor to afford them. :<