thrilllower level invite teams should never have lan as a goal. invite to me was just having the opportunity to play against the best players. the goal is to show how you play as a player and teammate. ninjanick, milo, xalox, squid and decimate are only some players in the top teams in invite this season that just took the beatdown of being on a lower invite team and pushed themselves to get on better teams.
if paying 60 bucks each season during that time isn't worth having you improve. then the game isn't for you.
On the other side of the issue, not everyone feels that the price jump isn't worth is worth it. I guess it could just be me, but I could never pay that for invite. I know this a very outside thought, but how long does everyone think we can support 3 LANs a year? I still feel that we need to plan for the future in that case.