We collaborated on making a new logo for The Mafia and their merchandise has been released for their return in Season 15 Invite!

You know what happens when they take our money...

https://merch.firesidecasts.tv/collections/the-mafia

https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/1048709721420468224/1235383256107581462/mafia_b_notext.png?ex=66342bd0&is=6632da50&hm=b675a14f3d6728361d9be08ba868a9f73d4951c300c82191fc4fc205d406b515&=&format=webp&quality=lossless&width=671&height=671

NA Serveme servers now have the fireside configs you will need for the cup #ThankYouArie

NOTICE: The deadline to join the cup is Friday, May 10, 2024 11:59 PM (Eastern Time)

Sign up here: https://play.toornament.com/en_US/tournaments/7644781294107238400/

Basic Q&A here: https://www.teamfortress.tv/64439/fireside-cup-extra-information-and-basic-q-a

And once again ty to Mannco.store for sponsoring this cup! (please click on this link they care about how much our affiliate link is clicked lel)

Oo good to see this map being actively updated! Might run some playtests on Fireside and see if we can gather some feedback for you :)

https://i.imgur.com/9TIy9Rg.jpeg

https://i.imgur.com/9TIy9Rg.jpeg

Bump, don't forget to SIGN UP! The team list is pretty insane:

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NOTABLE TEAMS

habib and botmode
kobe1920 and logan
yumyum and dolphinrider (joshuawn)
weeb_whacker and saxophone
emmi and rive (defending champs)
jw. and hallu
yalin and ALOV (from Europe!)
deadlyseed and Guyehhh

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Prize Pool Distribution

1st: 100 keys
2nd: 32 keys
3rd-4th: 16 keys
5-8th: 4 keys

#ILostThat

serv0 plays in esl challenger (esea premier for cs2) https://www.hltv.org/matches/2371803/one-more-vs-nouns-esl-challenger-league-season-47-north-america

only having a week between season end and invite playoffs is very worrying, well, unless they plan on making invite 6 weeks instead of 8 weeks. and they don't use the last two weeks as a buffer to reschedule matches

So I didn't realize but apparently our Youtube Livestreams were all unlisted

If you can't find your vod on our youtube playlists/twitch highlights we have probably saved any match since October of 2023 here:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLSw7XtwkU5aReSnEbv7lAZZKwTFP4vMiM

GLHF!

If they aren't saved here then we probably lost it to the depths of time or it's on Dr. Underscore/Pika/antlers' hard drive!

sponsorships from either marketplace.tf or mannco.store would only net at most, an extra $1-$1.5k per season

and dont even suggest tf2easy or any gambling site as a sponsor

FYI: We posted a basic Q&A here:

https://www.teamfortress.tv/64439/fireside-cup-extra-information-and-basic-q-a

One thing I'd like to highlight is we'd like to try to make this a reoccurring thing every off season. Of course the one off class limit is just a one time gimmick, we're trying to have fun after overworking ourselves this season :p

I have the entire vod saved but I got copyright striked when uploading it to YT

Hello all!

I'm very glad to be running a 6s cup this off season. After a very successful charity draft cup that we ran with more.tf just this past weekend, I'm excited to be putting in more of Fireside's time and money (primarily with the help of the sponsorship from Mannco.store and our video editor, Nightfaul) into trying to revitalize the tournament circuit with some off season cup.

Note that as the article mentions, this is our first tournament where not only are we running the broadcast side of things, but also the tournament organization and administration. We hope that we can provide a smooth experience for all. Let's clear up a few questions and clarifications:

A one off-class only cup? Will this be a reoccurring theme for future Fireside Cups where quirks will be included in every cup?

The one off-class restriction was an idea suggested by just jazz that was originally under the guise of it being a no off-class tournament. But, when presenting the idea to some players in the scene, we tweaked the idea to limit the off-class to restrict to only one off-class. Another idea we had was using the ETF2L config for the group stage, but with the cup spanning across two weeks, this idea was backtracked on and we will be using the progressive ruleset.

Our understanding is that this primarily impacts last holds, but we are very curious to see how teams approach the dilemma of denying sniper sightlines. Will you run a counter sniper? Or will you run an engineer and focus on cohesive work between your projectiles to deny chokepoints?

As for the one off-class component being a reoccurring theme, I would say it's unlikely. To us, this is just a one-off thing where we're just having fun with the money and time we have invested in the scene. While we do understand your opinions on this, bear with us for just one cup.

Why across two weeks?

We believe that trying to cram the entire cup into one weekend is unideal, and we referenced the running of the Essentials Monthly Cups, which generally ran in one weekend.

Running this cup on weekdays at normal scrim times during an off season where teams will probably be scrimming anyways allows us to run the matches at default times. This should prevent the mental taxation of playing a weekend cup for hours on end.

Is this cup for Invite teams only?

No, this cup has an open registration. We do have a team cap of 16 though. We encourage teams of all skill levels to sign up. Consider the cup as a preseason to the actual regular season, but the preseason has a prize pool. Note that teams are manually approved and this is not a first come, first serve though. Invite teams will be prioritized.

Where can I find the config to implement on our server?

You can find the server configuration on our github:

https://github.com/FiresideCasts/ServerResources/releases/tag/1.0.0

If you need help implementing this on your server, please reach out to us on our discord server.

***We are planning to also make this available on na.serveme.tf servers, but please do not treat this as a guarantee until we get a final confirmation.

Toornament is requesting an email per player we're signing up? Why?

This is a recent addition by the Toornament platform as a mandatory change. Fireside will not need to view, use or validate team member e-mails in any way. However, because Toornament has made the field mandatory, some valid text must be entered to complete the team registration process. Please use the #cup-support channel in our discord for further questions or concerns.

Where is the prize pool from?

Nightfaul, our video editor, has graciously given us the prize pool. As for the Mannco.store sponsorship, we intend to use their sponsorship to pay our behind the scenes people for the work they do. These people have put in so much work for us, so it's only right that we give them paid opportunities.

If you would like to contribute to the prize pool, please reach out to me on discord - siyo_.

Player streams need to be approved? Why must we use a sponsor overlay?

A perspective to look at is not only the return on investment for the players participating with their own time, but for Fireside, EssentialsTF, and any sponsors involved in the running of the cup. To be frank, for most if not all sponsors, the TF2 competitive community is generally an investment with a negative return. This is a harsh reality for people who have never been involved in the planning and outreach of a tournament, but many of my fellow peers could echo this sentiment.

We want to look good for the very few sponsors we have in the scene, which is why we require this rule. If we intend on running future cups and events in the future, we want to maximize the interest of any reoccurring and future sponsors into the TF2 scene.

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Thank you all and I will try my best to answer any questions!