The casual side of video games calls competitive players sweaty, toxic try-hards and insist they ruin every game. The competitive side of video game calls casuals low-skilled whiners who need to get good or quit the game. I can't think of a game whose casual and competitive side co-exist. Even for small communities where you could reasonably know all the regulars names like Left4Dead, it's still an awful battle of "us vs. them". Why would TF2 be different?

If only there were tools to make it easier to protect your privacy or block these people out.

https://i.imgur.com/4XpdVy9.png

I'm so confused by what this means. Like, they'll ban anyone who tries to start a playoff boycott? What if multiple people join in, do they all get banned? What if a bunch of people already agreed privately and then someone makes a thread announcing there are ten teams participating, does only the OP of that thread get banned? I mean, the whole point of a boycott is to be disruptive, so how do you enforce a ban on purposeful disruptive techniques?

Heartbreaking that the stream audio was delayed so that moment wasn't properly captured.

The unfortunate reality is that someone with severe mental issues will only get worse with constant access to the internet, so building a support network via internet friendships will basically guarantee the person never gets better. The entire TF2 community can decide to not react to her overnight, and she will find refuge in another community (maybe another video game, a hobbyist discord, a message board) where the entire process repeats itself.

If you think that isn't true and they can surely get better if they just have a couple of good friends to DM, then I wonder if you think the best course of action for an addict is to learn moderation instead of practicing sobriety. As long as someone with issues who has access to the internet where she can obsessively check old posts about her that upset her, have parasocial relationships with top invite players to feel valued, and interact with any troll or bully that comes their way, it's only going to get worse. A TFTV thread dedicated to a single person is way more harmful than helpful even if the intention is to spread awareness. Now RoL has something she can obsessively refresh and get mad at for the next few days.

What did the half-time used to be when there was a second-half config? It's been awhile since I've played in a 6's league (and even then, only played in lower divs) and I remember the half-time wait lasting around 10 to 20 min depending on the team. I'm trying to look up old configs and getting mixed results of 5min to 15min limits during a half-time break.

Physical sports are allowed multiple time-outs, but they vary from time limits depending on the sport (as short as 30 seconds to as long as two minutes). I feel like a single time-out would just not be enough for any competitive team environment. Would a better solution be multiple tac pauses are allowed, but they can only be around two minutes? Is that enough time for higher level play to discuss strategy at the start of a new round? I thought that the way tac pauses were supposed to work is that you were allowed a maximum amount of time total to use them and once you exceeded 5 minutes, you could no longer pause. I have no idea if they changed this for grand finals to "# of tac pauses" instead of "# of min total used for tac pauses".

I think there were also a few technical tac pauses that happened, so it did compound.

"I'm going to omit the player's name in a file named 'The Reno'".

huh???

Why do the stockings keep giving me puke and mud colors.

https://i.postimg.cc/tCxks7Kg/Untitled.png

Gwen heard about those poorly made RGL stickers and started making her own bootleg merch.

How do you stop talking about pedos while also making sure people never forget they're pedos so they don't go after newer members of competitive that aren't aware of their reputation?

run it back, kev wasn't there.

I thought for awhile now that AM+IM and Main+Advanced should go from four divs to two divs. It feels like in those divs there is always one team reigning supreme because there isn't a lot of challenging competition. Often when that team moves up a div, they struggle to place in the middle of that div. Having a wider pool of teams to play against would very gradually improve a lot of people's skill instead of this current situation where the skill gap between IM and Main or Main and Advanced feels huge. I think a lot of people run into that scenario as the season progresses where their team is getting better and there's only two or three teams worth scrimming at that point. Even just improving that number to six or seven teams worth scrimming could make things feel less stale in the long run.

Newcomer (Unpaid)
Intermediate (I don't know if this should be paid or if that would chase away newbie move-ups. Maybe a lower price, but there's more teams, so it evens out?)
Advanced (Paid)
Invite (Paid)

https://i.ibb.co/ZTjkL7B/Untitled.png

I WOULD PREFER NO UPDATES OVER THIS SHIT

https://i.kym-cdn.com/entries/icons/original/000/038/932/tco_-_2021-11-24T113041.108.jpg

It still wouldn't be sufficient evidence because it's to be expected that someone playing on a rental without their config, mouse, or keyboard is going to perform slightly worse than usual. If Elijah went to LAN and used entirely rental equipment and didn't perform as well, people would say it's proof that he's cheating because he's not able to put up the stats. If he plays on a rental but is allowed to use his mouse and keyboard, people would still say it's possible he cheated because we know from CS:GO players that you can put cheating software in your mouse and keyboard.

https://www.reddit.com/r/GlobalOffensive/comments/z9x9gm/swedish_documentary_on_cheating_in_csgo_shows_the/

The only definite settlement we could hypothetically have is if someone came in and took Elijah's computer away for a surprise inspection, spent a few days inspecting every single file on the computer, and then declare it clean or not.

I guess, in theory, you could have Elijah prepare to go to a LAN, send the people who are running the LAN his TF2 config and hardware specs. They would go out and get an identical mouse and keyboard and input his exactly settings. Then hook all that up to a rental and see if he still performs. That's also a lot of shit to do for one person to prove he's not cheating. Even if we had 100% proof that Elijah is not cheating right now, people still are soured on the first cheating ban and wouldn't want him back in the community regardless. So all the discussions about what he COULD do to gain people's trust will always run into a dead end. The discussion about cheating bans and if they should be infinite or not can actually go somewhere, but now with the extra talking point of whether or not they should be enacted retroactively for some.