On comes Season 7.... or maybe not?
ESEA has announced Sign ups for it's Season 7 campaign alongside a slew of new features and announcements that on top of a larger prize pot also includes the ever so tasty to talk about threat of not supporting usl. Yea there's a catch, and its really quite simple - ESEA is asking that the TF2 Community supports ESEA by signing up 50 teams into the Open division, and considering that last season ESEA had 40 this doesn't seem like too big of a stretch. One thing to keep in mind however is that with the addition of an Intermediate division, the number to sign ups doesn't only have to go up by 10 teams but presumably 10+ the number of teams that move into intermediate.
I think the community if it chooses to can absolutely accomplish this goal, the question is, are we going to? I've talked to several people from different stages in their competitive careers and the reactions have varied from a battle cry to support and in extreme cases "save the game" through this league to "*%$@ that, they called us whiners, that's classy customer support right there." ESEA has been what many consider to be the games top league for the past several seasons, and for the past two in particular ESEA has brought TF2 to public venues at their Lan Championships. I for one hope that ESEA sticks by the game and that the community can rise up to the challenge but either way, I think the game's only going to grow - with or without ESEA.
Taken Directly from ESEA's website:
After another successful LAN final with Counter-Strike 1.6, Counter-Strike: Source, and Team Fortress 2, we're happy to announce ESEA League Season 7 which will feature over $55,000 in cash prizes and a LAN event for all Invite division playoffs. Season 7 will also feature a number of improvements based on user and team feedback from Season 6.
Registration for S7 is now open and will remain so until Monday August 23rd at 11:59pm EST. Once registration closes there will be a week for teams to get acquainted with the system and to schedule their first matches, which will begin Sunday August 29th.
Key Changes From Season 6 to Season 7:
- Increased prize pot from $50,000 to $56,550
- Map rotations for each game will chosen by the community (more info soon)
- Players banned for cheating in a non-league server will no longer result in matches being overturned
- Increased number of League servers on new hardware to ease scheduling availability
Features of ESEA League include:
- Two matches per week for all divisions
- Complete web match scheduling
- SMS scheduling alerts
- All matches played on our ESEA servers across eight locations
- Protection from our industry leading anti-cheat / config locking Client
- Helpful team of handpicked paid league Admins who are active in each community
- Complete box scores and stats for EVERY match (just as we have for pugs and scrims)
- HLTV and SourceTV demo downloads for every match within 5 minutes of matches finishing
- Automatic live HLTV and SourceTV for every match (unlimited number of spectators)
- Automatic live irc scorebots for every match
- Automatic POV demo recording
- User prediction system for every match
- LAN event for all Invite division playoffs
- You build your permanent league record
First up, a change in our cheating policy has been one of the most requested / talked about topics in recent memory. Now, teams no longer have to worry about retribution from a player they cut as matches will only be overturned when that player is caught cheating in a league server.
Another key change is the move to put the CS 1.6 Main final four back online. While we were thoroughly impressed with the dedication last season's Main teams showed (which will be reflected in the upcoming Invite team list) we felt that for now we need to focus on building up the Invite division prize pots. Had we kept the Main final four on LAN, the need to grow the Invite prize pot (to continue to keep top teams motivated) would have directly conflicted with the need to grow the Main prize pot (to keep it attractive enough for Main teams to travel).
Lastly, as promised, we will be completely dropping all support for TF2 for Season 7, but there's a catch. We've worked hard to address the many issues and suggestions TF2 players have had with our services including Client update response time (we're down to an average of roughly 45 minutes), scrim servers (in public testing), as well as an Intermediate division. We've done our part, now it's up to the community to man up, stop whining, and save TF2 on ESEA themselves. ESEA TF2 Season 7 will only happen if at least 50 TF2 Open teams are paid by the close of registration.
Team move ups and move downs, a full prize pot breakdown, as well as the map rotations will be announced within the next two weeks so be sure and check back often.
So, whats it going to be? Stand up and fight like this is our last breath to keep this league's support on our side or turn away and look to other leagues in hope of success?
Comments
From who exactly…
These things take time, money, and resources and we want to see a commitment from the TF2 community to support us the same way we have been supporting you all. If we don't see it then we will instead focus our resources on games that have more openly embraced and supported us.
It isn't meant to be an egotistical threat, just simply stating the reality. That being said, I hope we hit our goals and can continue to improve ourselves and provide good things for the community.
I still find it hard to believe that there are companies that do business this way.
1. get our egos stroked
2. get our egos stroked
3. profit
4. deliver services as advertised
A league sans the auto-srctvs (that only work a generous 70% of the time) will be a bit harder to cover, I'll admit; but it's not about doing what's easiest to cover, it's about taking the game forward. You can't do that at the point of a gun. You guys do the league's work for them in getting a bunch more teams on board and paid, you pay them, for what exactly? So that the client can break on a weekly basis and everyone goes home in the red from the LAN in another few months?
I don't really see it…
#5 has this right, tbh, minus the 'required' part. If it were easy to schedule a match with the option of booking a server through tf2lobby or using your own server, that seems pretty ideal…
Also, what is this about a catch? So basically they'll be dropping everything as promised unless they can see enough business to convince them otherwise? Or is there some other reason that I'm missing?
The issue with having these features is they rely on teams playing on the league's servers or at the very least, with the leagues tracking mods running on their servers. The former is what ESEA does and the latter is what Hawkeye has told me is possible but you have to understand the perspective of all of the other leagues (including CEVO). It is their philosophy that players should have their own servers with as little league intrusion as possible. Although there are positive aspects in the realm of coverage, many players have historically been against what ESEA does now (and surely the GSPs are).
As for the ESEA quote itself…all I can say is wow. It's over ESEA, nice knowin' ya!
That's a lot of attitude to start off that paragraph:
Quote:
As promised? So you're cancelling it, just to stay true to your word, then offering us a way back? No middle ground? I mean, if there is 49 teams, does that mean invite is a no-go? If ESEA compromises, they might as well just have cleared up the future of invite.
They haven't even announced prize pots yet.
ESEA has some deifnitey pros. Even with TGBF, pwnageTV and eXtv, it'd be very difficult to follow the Competitive scene without their auto-scores/scheduling/prizepots/stats/stvs. If Cevo or another organization can step forward with these features, and a proven track record, they could make a swoop here.
I haven't made up my own mind fully, but some thoughts to consider.
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