again, nobody's expecting you to actively change the world overnight. I don't think you need to spend your time in pubs arguing with others, because that could arguably make it worse. all I really want out of players right now is for them to put on a tag that shows they're competitive, and how to play competitive. show awareness, solidify being a better community (which, rly, just comes down to "always improve yourself as a person", like you should be in general), and nothing more than that.

in general, it's not as difficult as I think people are making it. again, you won't become a cbear or star overnight by putting a tag in your name, but it helps. make people acknowledge your existence, and make yourself better than you were yesterday (which can be interpreted in many ways, and all of them work in this scenario). if you want to do more than that like many have, great! but in general, the big issue here is that nobody even knows that you exist. fixing that's a great start

the dude's kind of justified in stating his disdain for a bit of the tf2 community, considering how ppl take his existence as a spy main on here.

for all intents and purposes, his tech with stabs and using them effectively popularized spy as something more than providing intel and sitting back often in HL, and he was a fantastic example of bringing new players into competitive play by showing what he could do. hell, I'd say spy takes a good amount of technical skill high-level because of him, since a lot of his success in backstabs come from knowing how to do shit like strafestabs consistently, and having a chance to still pick someone off with his tech once he was caught.

it's a shame, I recall him saying he wanted to talk more overall strategy highlander on his channel over specific stabs after his last one. that would have done a lot to show people in, I'd think

considering this seems to be popping up as a common response, I'd say it's a good assumption to think otherwise

FWIW, I'm against most forms of moderation for stuff deemed offensive, because I feel like, at best, that's a bandaid and doesn't actually solve why those things are being said by those people. I'd prefer simply letting people change and grow better over time, because that saves a lot of splintering between the faces of the community and "those people" like you see in CSGO/LoL. the FGC does this to what I think is good effect, and they're as no-holds-barred as it comes, it's just that the shaming is done by other people within that community.

I also wouldn't recommend absolutely obsessing over a better community, either, but that's why a community-wide effort is important. this is why I think stuff like playcomp.tf as a tag is a brilliant idea, because it's miniscule effort on everyone's part, but en-masse, can do quite well assuming everyone uses it. I'd rather take a lot of mini-langes over one lange that inevitably gets burned out from carrying so much weight on his shoulders, I suppose

perhaps people should be more apathetic about the game they pour hundreds to thousands of hours into like you are, and never feel emotions

this will solve everything, surely

"well [x] is more toxic" doesn't particularly make you or I any less toxic, no

quoting my post from a different thread, still proves correct:

congrats on the self-fulfillment, though. everyone else in FPSes are apathetic, so games not propped up by company support dies off, so obviously that's proof that being apathetic is the best option, I guess?

I think competitive TF2's biggest issue is how okay it is with slowly bleeding out. there's a lot of excuses being made that are trying to skirt around the bigger issue, that issue being that beyond a handful of important players, players don't want to help support all that much. for'real, y'all genuinely believe the ruleset a bunch of dudes built out of trial-and-error for a decade is more popular than any other form of melee, a game that sold 7 million copies? don't be ridiculous, in the grand scheme of things melee's competitive play was quite tiny, but community leaders were stubborn about keeping their support. you don't get that breast cancer drive loaded without a strong core, after all.

one of the most depressing things I saw from this community so far was in the thread regarding lange, where players just kind of assumed people would come to these communities naturally by virtue of them existing, and there's no reason to ever care otherwise. do you realize the implications of those statements, how incredibly bad that looks for anyone who cares about helping? that's pretty saddening to see, I'd say.

going back to that cancer drive for a moment. one incredibly important factor in melee winning that came from bobby scarnewman (dude who now works at twitch, PeoplesChamp etc). people like him, and prog, and so many of the top players for melee poured their heart and soul into making everyone watch his stream and prepare for a massive outpour on the final day. I remember trying not to scream in the middle of the night when it was announced melee won that, and just thinking internally, "holy shit, imagine the things our community can do when we put our effort together like this!".

and then everything else in 2013 and beyond happened because of this, and that was that. this is a really important factor that smash as a community has, and you can see it everywhere. do what you can, promote tournaments that are happening, teach people about the game, talk and discuss with others publicly. maybe the dude who talks about tournaments all the time on twitter isn't on the level of someone like prog and d1, a commentary duo that introduced so many new players into the depth of the game, but any support is good support, and he's giving it out.

see that "comp.tf" tag people've been rocking recently? that might not make you lange, or tagg or cbear or admirable. but there's an important, notable chance that you might get a good pub player to ask your about it, and you can help them, and that is exactly one more person who is in this community than before. you do not believe how much that can add up over time. it's small, but it can work, because even a slight hint of effort can take you god damn everywhere.

one more point I want to make, when regarding smash: officially, nintendo did not officially acknowledge smash's competitive scene until earlier this summer. that's about a year and a half past the ball starting to roll, a year and a half after we started to get noticed on a large scale. official support's nice, but it doesn't beat a mass community effort, no matter what.

source: am smash player
not very GOOD, mind, but I know enough about what I'm in to explain

was just an off-hand example, cause I can't think of anyone else who runs the same off-class in both leagues. for a more viable example, I'd go for maybe sigafoo's engineer

bring back solidsnake

how many good HL players can handle top 6s play, I wonder? we'd get a lot more off of someone like stabby using spy unlocks than some dude who normally off-classes to him once every twenty matches

you can easily question a lot of weapon bans by the fact that nobody even knows why some of them are banned, including league staff. there was glitches that were patched out years ago, and weapons were still banned long after that, and any changes to a weapon isn't really accounted for post-ban. for example: why the hell is the liberty launcher and cow mangler still banned in ESEA? I don't even remember the last time those were even considered sidegrades, let alone upgrades.

why are the engineers not firing pomson shots at random in choke points hoping that it hits a medic

this is unoptimal asshole play, I am disappointed

kaptain, 40

I have the hindsight of direct hit to thank me for my new hat

caber med pick count: 1

nah dude, if you're allowed the vita saw you damn well better use that disruption of one of the most important mechanics of TF2 with some pride

who's valmaster, and how did they 2-0 both ricky and wong in losers