BLANCTV dips into Intermediate tonight for Metalworks action between Bingo Night eSports, LLC (9-2) and yeezy team (6-5). While the records are quite distant, Bingo Night eSports (one of the best team names in the entire league) have been having roster stability issues, and suffered a grueling 4-1 loss earlier this week at the hands of MyHentaiList. Who knows what could happen tonight. Join Tery and zanda at 10:30 EST.

Bump. If you constantly show up to "9:30 scrims" at 9:45 then please adjust your fucking clocks 15 minutes early. For the love of god.

This has been a public service announcement.

I don't think I've been more heartbroken in TF2 than when I found out "florida man" is actually from Massachusetts.

Jokes aside, I've covered a couple of florida man's games over the last two seasons and he's been a force at the level he's been playing at, both on Demo and Scout. He was part of a Newbie Mix Team Drive so I'm sure has good instincts and fundamentals.

Goodbye Gostkowski. It was a helluva career.

sorry, gaming (5-4) is back for another week as BLANCTV covers their bout vs. Lobsters.tf (7-2). The former had a smooth Gullywash week before succumbing in their first Villa match to watch This. Meanwhile Lobsters.tf, on top of having a fantastic team name, are off to a great start in Main after finishing 3rd in Intermediate last season. Almost as if staying together is a good thing or something... Anyway! Tune in at 10:30 EST with me and zanda for Villa fun.

Match: https://rgl.gg/Public/Match.aspx?m=10085&r=40
Stream: twitch.tv/terywj

LET'S GO VIRGIL!

Don't worry, this is TF2. I'm sure someone will be revealed as a cheater, or get cut for someone blatantly better, or unleash slurs soon enough.

BLANCTV brings some more Main action this Friday when Obese Whales (3-3) host sorry, gaming (4-3) on Gullywash. As the wonderful wbacon alluded to the above power rankings, the former has had a myriad of results while the latter's roster hijack has led to three straight wins. Both teams are sitting on the cusp of top 8, so it should be an entertaining showdown.

Match: https://rgl.gg/Public/Match.aspx?m=9885&r=40
Stream: twitch.tv/terywj

Dan Quinn fired. Adam Gase when. Matt Patricia when.

BLANCTV is excited cover Amateur tonight with The Hive (1-1) vs. Med's Dead, Baby (1-1). The Hive has three players from C-SPAN, who placed 2nd in Newcomer during Season 3. Meanwhile, Med's Dead, Baby has TFTV's very own production master extraordinaire louster200. Join me and zanda for the Clearcut content at 9:30 EST.

Who is taiga? I only know am I a ball.

sail, taiga, Recurse, and squidie are beasts. Immediate threats.

Chiefs vs. Ravens tonight should be spicy. Don't see Mahomes losing it, so KC 35 - BAL 27.

BLANCTV kicks off Season 4 coverage with a Main showdown between Portland Burnsiders and Panty Raid @ 10:30. Both teams are back for another season and looking for their first win, with the Burnsiders losing a close affair against Six Bone Throne while Panty Raid fell to Obese Whales. Should be some familiar names in this matchup like RainofLight, Grape Juice III (now playing Medic!), and Syntax (a previous Burnsider). Tune in Saturday at 10:30 EST for the action.

Match: https://rgl.gg/Public/Match.aspx?m=9186&r=40
Stream: twitch.tv/terywj

I've been telling the admins since the ShiningStar switch during week 2 of last season that class restriction guidelines need to be stated in the rules to prevent this exact sort of thing from happening: where it's just case-by-case basis via admin discretion. Having any sort of outline would at least form a base of which to work off of. Special cases would be much better received if there was already a foundation in place. It simply cannot be a "this team is okay even with X mainclassing" or "this team is doing bad because of restrictions" situation because it leads to all the inconsistencies. Whether it involves consecutive placements in a div (kronge realm), and / or higher div experience from a longer time ago (KTB)...something, anything, needs to added to the rules.

I would agree with this if we actually had examples (in RGL). Of the 13 rosters that started in Div-1 last season, only three of them returned in any capacity. Only one* of the playoff teams returned: kronge realm, who are now (conveniently) offclassing in the same div that they've placed top 3 over the last three seasons. Of the playoff teams from S2 Advanced, only three returned (none to Invite). Same for S1 Advanced. We simply don't have many higher-level teams that stick together - it's why Invite has only seen eight teams once in RGL's four seasons. If this was ESEA tri would have killed Invite before letting only six teams exist in the division.

* Destructive Criticism and babe, it's 10PM sort of merged so it's really like one and a half?

Invite teams already make "profit" simply by existing and surviving until the end of the season. It costs $240 for a full Invite roster and you get $600 even for coming in dead last - giving each player a $60 profit. Unfortunately, you earn the same amount by winning Div-1 (though 2nd and worse is less profit). So yeah people will rather go for a championship in a lower div than play low Invite when the prize money is the same. Only way around a monetary incentive would be to restructure prize pool distribution and skew it heavy towards Invite, which may or may not sit well with people.

Another issue. RGL doesn't keep track of matches played and only roster time, so unless you were following the teams super closely you don't know if someone was actually active on the roster or just a sub. Case in point: BiG was a sub for my Div-2 team last season and played one match. Outside of that he played 10 matches of ESEA IM over two years ago. I don't think that qualifies for a restriction. Then on the other hand you have the aforementioned KTB case.

If people didn't bring this up during the end-of-the-season surveys that's one thing, but I feel like regardless of that there needs to be something in the RULES so people will always know exactly what they can or cannot do. The restrictions and dumb playoff sizes were my two biggest problems with the league last season. They're 0-for-1 already, time will tell what happens down the stretch.

Doesn't deserve what happened to him. After playing against Gritoma over the last couple of seasons he's definitely been improving.