I knew I wasn't the only one seeing this.

New grenade launcher is actually really cool but underwhelming when you think about it realistically, not enough oomph to the roller package. Everyone loves functional rollerjumping, though.

Because that's the audience that's going to give them the most money bar none.

I absolutely would not leave unlocks up to democracy, especially at this point in time.

There are (apparently) 135 stat-unique weapons in TF2. Out of all of those, I think I can count 6 unlocks (Pain Train, Gunboats, Crusader's Crossbow, Kritzkrieg, Ubersaw, Escape Plan) as some sort of useful utility to warrant frequent usage that isn't completely off the wall. There are other unlocks like Chargin' Targe, Eyelander, Wee Booties, Force of Nature, Direct Hit, Concheror, Liberty Launcher, Righteous Bison, Black Box, Shortstop, Scottish Resistance, Overdose, Vaccinator, Blutsauger, Buff Banner, etc that simply don't see a whole lot of usage either because the item doesn't do enough to warrant using it for an extended period of time or that it would just be better to use stock. Then we have what I'm going to call "community questioners"; weapons that have split the community in different sections concerning the weapon's balance such as the Quick Fix and Loose Cannon. Let's total the weapons I've mentioned up:

6 frequently used "safe" unlocks
15 niche unlocks
2 "community questioners"
=
23 weapons

That's just for the standard 6s classes, and those are just the most frequently used/talked about weapons when we do talk about them. There are still outliers like the Market Gardener, all-or-nothing weapons like the Loch n' Load (although Benroads and I in our autismical behavior did a little testing on this and it can do stupid numbers even with damage spread off), and THEN we have weapons for utility classes like the Backburner, KGB, and Cloak & Dagger (pyro, heavy, and spy respectively). At this point in time where the community population is shifting, I don't think it's at all wise to individually test each and every weapon we've got (because that actually does get complicated) nor do I think it's any better to leave weapon pick/ban decisions in the hands of the majority, let alone on a game-to-game basis. Hell, if I had my druthers we'd be testing vanilla 6s in comparison to cinnamon (vanilla + paltry useful unlocks) play instead but eh.

gr8stalin

demoman

esea-o

gully

https://www.dropbox.com/s/jwvvqrs5wyboq4t/20141221-2023-cp_gullywash_final1.dem?dl=0

1. The parts of the old guard I know don't pub anymore because pubs are a mess since TF2 is no longer as Valve originally promoted it (I can write a big nerd essay about this and might make it a semester break project as a writing exercise). Those that do usually pop hud_say_text_time and voice_enable 0 in console and just goof around.

2. The first part goes back to point 1 in that a lot of the people that most would consider the "pub stomp" crowd don't even play pubs anymore. The second part I've never seen happen outside of a UGC player/Lobbystar pops into a server hoping to be the big shit on campus dropping hot meme binds when he kills tommy.rodriguez156 who might as well have no monitor.

Because lowering the bar worked out so well for the American Public Education System, right? Most of the people who use "toxic" as an excuse for not wanting to play competitive anything most likely aren't good enough to play competitively in the first place and let's face it: would you REALLY want someone like that in the community at all? Meb and downpour are ultimately right: the amount of time needed for investment in bringing in people who are simply stuck in their viewpoint far outweighs the return. Some people are simply satisfied by going engineer and having the game played for them or going pyro and swinging their mouse around violently (most can't even do this) for free kills. I'm not about to launch a crusade to convince them that they're not having fun and that they need to see the light that we're a super-polite community, and you shouldn't either.

"Toxic" has just become a codeword for "things I don't like". Sure, a whole lot of problems in the real world let alone in this community would be solved if everyone was at the very least able to forgive each other and/or get over stupid bullshit, but I don't think I could find anything really "toxic" about 6s TF2 at the ESEA level unless someone wants to go full redditumblr on me. The only community in which I could honestly say that there's a community-level problem in terms of bringing in new people would be Quake/CPMA and Benroads could talk about that for hours if need be.

For years I was always a promoter of reaching out to people who wanted a more serious play environment but who weren't ready to handle 6s/ESEA-level 6s, but as the years go on I've begun to see that a lot of my hopes just aren't realistic and that if people are really going to list "toxicity" as a reason not to play a video game I just don't know what to say.

I hope that only applies to Highlander.

I bought a GTX 760 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130932 specifically) because I needed a new tower in a rush but the GTX 970 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814487076 - just a random one I grabbed) is supposed to have more bang for its buck. I have a 650w sitting in here with that 760, dunno if anyone I know has a 970 yet so I couldn't tell you power requirements outside of reading the specs page on newegg. Either card will most likely do you just fine for Source games (although I dunno what exactly your i5 is, I've got a 4690k) and I haven't been let down so far. Pretty much every game I've thrown at the combo + 8gb DDR3 1600 RAM has run just fine (triple-digit framerates) at high settings.

Excuse me, but I'd just like to interject for a moment. What you’re referring to as competitive TF2, is in fact, 6v6/TF2, or as I’ve recently taken to calling it, 6s plus TF2. TF2 is not a competitive video game unto itself, but rather another free component of a fully functioning competitive system made useful by the GNU corelibs, shell utilities and vital system components comprising a full competitive community as defined by Gotfrag and teamfortress.tv. Many computer users play a modified version of the TF2 system every day, without realizing it. Through a peculiar turn of events, the version of competitive TF2 which is widely used today is often called “Highlander”, and many of its users are not aware that it is basically the 6v6 system, developed by the 6v6 Project. There really is a competitive Highlander TF2, and these people are using it, but it is just a part of the system they use. 6v6 is the kernel: the program in the system that allocates the machine’s resources to the other programs that you run. The kernel is an essential part of a competitive community, but useless by itself; it can only function in the context of a complete community. TF2 is normally used in combination with the 6v6 gametype: the whole system is basically 6v6 with TF2 added, or 6v6/TF2. All the so-called “competitive TF2” distributions are really distributions of 6v6/TF2.

The point is that you have extended far over the boundary of what is acceptable in "reprimanding" someone. You shouldn't even be here. Not like Dave is actually looking at this in the first place but you've come to his last known e-watering hole to start an argument with people in his most recent community about something completely irrelevant that shouldn't have even made it to the TI forums at the heart of it all.

You're a pompous disgrace.

Quite frankly, I'm not laughing. As someone who was a legitimate founding member from the 352nd, I'm actually quite embarrassed by what TI has become and how you guys have reacted to this. This nanny-state damage control is pathetic. The rule-breaker shitlist was never used and never SUPPOSED to be used as some KGB/NSA-tier record keeper on everyone who broke the rules (seemingly or otherwise) like what you guys have done for Dave, it was meant for people who were legitimately hackers (why'd you have to do it Ezell) or facetious people who broke the rules for the sake of breaking them.

352nd => Team Interrobang => Idort's & Teek

If anything, this was just something that was a long time coming and it's finally here. People are getting tired of playing the same game with the same bunch of people for a shot at 15 minutes of fame for years on end, and I'll be damned if it even is the same game it was 7 years ago. Lord knows the community of TF2 in general certainly has changed for the worst.

What the future of 6s TF2 seems to hold lies in what happens to all old games with competitive communities; they hang on for dear life with a double or barely triple-digit playerbase (depending on the size of the game) that ends up learning how to do a lot of its own footwork. If anything, I see competitive TF2 in general becoming a larger version of die-hard communities like CPMA and UT2k4/99, and what I saw when games like Republic Commando began to enter their last stages. These bring along with them a whole slew of problems considering that #tf2mix still has trouble finding people to captain and play medic and lobbies are still inconsistent in starting/ending with 12 people even with 12 people in the webclient, but there's a reason to at least try to make this better now. Honestly, people should have dropped the notion that TF2 was ever going to be a big "esport" years ago; that gravy train left with what sponsors we had, but now's as good a time as any for the community to come together and try to at least make what this game has left good.

I don't particularly know myself, but I have a few details I remember from what Impulsenine and Flamed (part of the old guard) told me. Impulsenine and I spoke somewhere 2 years ago and I asked how everyone was doing and apparently Mondo took an emotional turn for the worst seemingly out of the blue, ruffled a lot of feathers. Apollo ragequit his post soon after I left TI apparently because of some dispute he had with the admin team concerning a pubber. Flamed and I had a haphazard in-game reunion a few months ago, and he told me afterwards that there was a lot of hand-changing after I left. He confirmed the Apollo ragequit and Mondo's retirement, but he generally boiled it down to the old farts of TI just getting older and simply not having the time or energy for TF2 like they used to. I guess the new admin team just isn't up to par with how the old guys took justice and server-starting into their own hands back in the day. They've also expanded into some other games with questionable results.

Arcanus still works about 20 minutes away from my hometown, though. Still plays while on a treadmill. Some things don't change.

Dave and I were TI members way back when. I tried to go back recently just to say hi, TI now is nothing like I remember it.