LegendaryRQAYes. Because the game is almost a decade old and most of the progress competitively speaking was only made in the past year. It's only recently that they decided to urban a bunch of weapons that were previously disallowed with the Global White list. Weapons like the CM5K and the Rescue Ranger were finally allowed to shine. Just the other day i was playing FaceIT and got a 2K with my sentry wile defending last, ran to mid, got a 3K with the RR itself, and then built a surprise sentry on the enemy's last resulting in another kill. How many times have you seen an Engie Coast-to-Coast push? I know there's probably a large quantity of people seething in their rage at the mere thought of an Engie pushing into last with lvl 3s but that's the kind of plays that (at higher levels) make people in the crowd go crazy. Trust me, people LOVE unorthodox strategies.
The bit I bolded is blatantly untrue. Where do you think we got the original whitelists from? Or the match timer, or the class limits? To be fair, I've been been playing for only just over a year, but very little progress has been made during that year. We unbanned a few weapons that were thought to be less broken, and even rebanned your beloved rescue ranger. Saying that these weapons have been allowed to "shine" is ridiculous. All the cow mangler does is dumb down the game by removing the need for ammo management, and the rescue ranger was rebanned because being able to repair your sentry from spawn and then instantly switch classes when it finally dies is insane.
I also seriously doubt you were able to do your "engi coast to coast" solely through the merits of the rescue ranger. If you took your sentry into their last, it's due to some combination of your team hard carrying you and the other team being hopelessly incompetent. The only example I know of the rescue ranger being able to do anything like what you described in an invite game was Ronin vs Bird Noises, setting a sentry up on mid, and that was just to lock in a stalemate to the end of the game. I can hardly even believe you're using a Faceit match as the basis to argue about the ultimate meta of the game.
LegendaryRQAWhat's with the mindset of clinging to an out-dated meta that has proven to result in sluggish games that stalemate and has a vary narrow appeal? If this were any other E-Sport, Soldiers and Scouts would have been nerfed heavily by now. I went to ESA and had a freaking blast, but i can guarantee for every 2 minute perfect round roll, there was a 10-15 minute stalemate where absolutely nothing happened (personally i think that's an issue with 5cp itself as a gamemode, but that's beside the point (No pun intended)). Something has to change.
"Out-dated meta." Outdated by what? I'll assume you're referring to what people love to refer to as the stale meta. As for why we "cling" to it, that's because it's good. It can't be argued that TF2's weapon meta has definitely stopped changing, but I think calling it stale implies there's something majorly wrong with it; instead, the term "stale" is just a holdover from every other esport. I think it'd be more appropriate to call it a stable meta; one where coordination and skill take precedence over experimenting with new weapon/class combos. I'm not really sure you watched the same Rewind I did--I don't recall a single 10 minute stalemate outside of Se7en games, and stalemates that long were rare even there. The meta is certainly not perfect, and there should be an effort to reduce those stalemates, but arbitrarily unbanning weapons that have spent years being banned for good reasons is a silly way to do it. I also think it's important to consider the idea that completely eliminating stalemates should not be the goal. Occasional short stalemates are important for casting analysis, for teams to consider short term tactics, and for viewers to understand what they've just seen; especially new ones. The fights that happen, the occasional offclasses to deal with specific situations in the game (as opposed to dealing with whatever shit the enemy has on their lineup), are all entertaining. They're good.
I also don't think you understand why solly and scout are run so pervasively. Other classes have options in a totally unrestricted meta. Were the gloves unbanned, heavy is completely viable outside of last, and even on mid. The issue is that fighting a heavy anywhere outside of last is boring and annoying, and if you think the current meta is slow, a meta where heavy is frequently run would totally stun you. Scout and solly are the fastest, most mobile classes in the game; putting rules in place that ensure they are run frequently helps minimize stalemates. Were other classes made to be as fun to fight against as scout, solly, and demo are, I think people would be a lot more open to seeing them run more often. Please, Valve, fix pyro.
LegendaryRQANobody is suggesting that. They're actually suggesting the exact opposite. Metas change and evolve. Sometimes in vary subtle ways like running at least on Fire-Punch user on team to deal with all the Bullet-Punch, Technician, Scizors running around; and sometimes in massive ways like Deciding on a whim that Lina should be played mid with a Eul's Scepter instead of a Support. Thous subtle changes happen occasionally in TF2. Like when the meta shifted from Shotgun to Gunboats. But thous massive changes seem to almost never happen because people are to stubborn to make the jump. Do know for how long BattleFury Ember Spirit was considered the absolute only way of playing the goddamn hero? But then some idiot thought it would be funny to buy a Veil on him and just run at people with Flame Guard and bursting them with triple Remnant; and now that's wildly considered to be the best way of playing him. Calling these kinds of shifts in the meta "superficial" honestly makes you look naive at best, and ignorant at worst.
That specific shift you referred to, I'm totally fine with. My issue is that in esports those types of shifts--where a weapon previously discarded as useless is experimented with and "discovered" as having a good purpose without being patched--are exceedingly rare. Most of the time, the game is patched, the weapons themselves change, thereby changing the rules of the game, and meta shifts develop from there. That kind of change is what I'm referring to as superficial. I'm arguing that TF2 is in a unique (are there any semi-popular exceptions besides Melee?), desirable position where the weapons meta has stabilized, and winners are determined by whoever plays the game with the most skill, as opposed to who abuses the current meta the best until the next patch comes out.