1 #1 aatje 0 Frags – + The weapons whitelist has been a source of considerable discussion in recent months. Arguments have been made for both sides, Valve's Game has been played and casted and streamed. This is my longish addition to the heap. I come at this topic from a mostly abstract perspective, and have a few points to add. Overall, the current way whitelists and weapons are handled in competitive TF2 is strongly positive, and should not be changed. Of course, you can tl;dr this wall of text all you want, but I won't be compromising my argument for brevity, I'm afraid. So, anyway, here is a frightfully, perhaps unforgivably long defense of the status quo. Word count: 2437, Reading time: 12 minutes Part 1: What we talk about when we talk about purity Calling a game pure is a compliment usually reserved from real-life sports such as football (soccer), tennis, boxing, or whatever you happen to prefer. What we mean by purity is simply the direct competition between individuals. The more directly two people or two teams are competing against each other, the purer the game or sport. Purity usually comes hand in hand with minimalism. Soccer is much purer than if every player had to wear various handicaps or was given various advantages. Imagine if some players had to carry ankleweights, some had to wear horse blinders, some were given hockey sticks they could hit the ball with, and some were given clown shoes. The object of the sport, to score goals, would remain the same, but it would be complicated by the intricacies of a rich meta of which players carried what weapons or handicaps and how would the manager counter that. If that sounds ridiculous, then consider how ridiculous people sound when they talk about e-sports. We see this exact sort of approach in the popular MOBAs. League of Legends has more than a hundred champions, each with different abilities, strengths and weaknesses. There are reasons for the existence of all these champions, which I will address in Part 2, but those reasons are not to benefit competitive gameplay. Just as in the absurd soccer hypothetical, direct competition between human beings is reduced by all this other stuff, by these impurities. CS:GO is impure in a different way. CS:GO has a variety of weapons and grenades, but FPS's probably need a variety. Rather, CS is impure because of its economy. The economy reduces direct competition between players because in a majority of rounds teams do not have equal or equivalent equipment. This means not only are the players competing against each other, the guns and grenades are competing against each other. Just like the champions, or the random crap in the soccer hypothetical, the presence of additional factors is cluttering and crowding out direct competition. This is what we walk about when we talk about impurities. TF2, however, with its whitelist, has neither a wide range of weapons or champions (classes), nor an economy. The existence of classes should not be confused for an impurity. First of all, teams run identical class structures the vast majority of the time. Secondly, classes should be thought of as simply packaging the various differences a CS player would get from his armor, his weapon, and his weapon's effect on his mobility. TF2 is an arena game, so these differences are more extreme in an absolute sense than in CS:GO, but relative to the way the TF2 universe works, the difference between the Soldier and the Scout is comparable to the difference between having armor and not, or running around with an AWP or a pistol. The vital difference is that in TF2, you don't buy Soldiers and Scouts, or Medics and Demomen, and you can't have three scouts or two medics because you have more money. Clockwork and b4nny never have to run out to mid with pistols against their opponent's scatterguns because their team is eco-ing a round. They are always competing directly against their opponents. That is the purity of competitive TF2. Everything is always the same. That allows the actual players to create all of the differences. Most rounds of CS:GO feature one team having superior equipment than their opponent and some aspect of worrying about preserving equipment. TF2 players never have to back away from a fight to save a sticky launcher. If you don't understand this argument about purity and directness, consider that most CS:GO matches feature multiple rounds where a player chooses not to fight his opponent in order to save his own gun. In these common situations, the game encourages non-competitiveness. Even the best player in the world would be sometimes recommended not to try his hardest to win the round, because of the way the economy works in the game. LoL is truly ridiculous with the limits it pushes impurities. At least in CS:GO, teams switch sides at the half. In LoL, whatever champion differences exist last through the entire match. Analysts frequently say a given match was won in the pick/ban phase. Consider how ridiculous that is! LoL is a game where it's valid to argue the match was decided before it was played. That's the complete opposite of direct competition. The competition between players was literally prevented by the advantage one team had from their champion selections. The problem with removing the TF2 whitelist, as some have argued doing, is that it reduces the purity of the game. Weapons differences might add strategy, but in doing so they reduce the direct competition between players. In soccer, the "meta" consists of using 3 center backs or 4, or how you arrange your midfield or strikers, where you play your players. It is not about whether your winger is wearing the clown shoes or the ankleweights. TF2 exists in a similar strategic space. The strategy is where you set up on the map, how you push, where in the team your personnel plays. It's not about having the best weapon. A version of competitive TF2 where strategy is about gaining advantage with your weapons is a version of competitive TF2 where teams are actively seeking to minimize direct competition between players. In some respect, that's all that strategy is: gaining advantages beyond of skill level. That means the more strategy in a sport, the less direct competition that sport has. In a way, strategy is an impurity. It's all about efficiently and elegantly creating strategic options without adding bullshit like a hundred champions or a hundred weapons. Compare Tennis and American Football. Tennis of course still has a great deal of strategy, and any fan can recall the way Nadal deliberately attacks Federer's backhand. Boxing is similar. Boxing and Tennis have a ton of strategy. But the NFL, by comparison, has a ton of tons. 90% of the NFL's millions of spectators can understand no more than 10% of the strategic levels the game is operating on, all the myriad the schemes and playcalls. LoL is similar. Of course, the NFL and LoL are wildly popular. But so are the World Cup and Wimbledon. It is safe to say that competitive TF2 is not wildly popular. That doesn't mean it needs to be changed. part 2 below The weapons whitelist has been a source of considerable discussion in recent months. Arguments have been made for both sides, Valve's Game has been played and casted and streamed. This is my longish addition to the heap. I come at this topic from a mostly abstract perspective, and have a few points to add. Overall, the current way whitelists and weapons are handled in competitive TF2 is strongly positive, and should not be changed.





Of course, you can tl;dr this wall of text all you want, but I won't be compromising my argument for brevity, I'm afraid. So, anyway, here is a frightfully, perhaps unforgivably long defense of the status quo.





[i]Word count: 2437, Reading time: 12 minutes[/i]





[u][b]Part 1: What we talk about when we talk about purity[/b][/u]





Calling a game pure is a compliment usually reserved from real-life sports such as football (soccer), tennis, boxing, or whatever you happen to prefer. What we mean by purity is simply the [b]direct competition between individuals[/b]. The more directly two people or two teams are competing against each other, the purer the game or sport.





Purity usually comes hand in hand with minimalism. Soccer is much purer than if every player had to wear various handicaps or was given various advantages. Imagine if some players had to carry ankleweights, some had to wear horse blinders, some were given hockey sticks they could hit the ball with, and some were given clown shoes. The object of the sport, to score goals, would remain the same, but it would be complicated by the intricacies of a rich meta of which players carried what weapons or handicaps and how would the manager counter that. If that sounds ridiculous, then consider how ridiculous people sound when they talk about e-sports.





We see this exact sort of approach in the popular MOBAs. League of Legends has more than a hundred champions, each with different abilities, strengths and weaknesses. There are reasons for the existence of all these champions, which I will address in Part 2, but those reasons are not to benefit competitive gameplay. Just as in the absurd soccer hypothetical, direct competition between human beings is reduced by all this other stuff, by these impurities.



CS:GO is impure in a different way. CS:GO has a variety of weapons and grenades, but FPS's probably need a variety. Rather, CS is impure because of its economy. The economy reduces direct competition between players because in a majority of rounds teams do not have equal or equivalent equipment. This means not only are the players competing against each other, the guns and grenades are competing against each other. Just like the champions, or the random crap in the soccer hypothetical, the presence of additional factors is cluttering and crowding out direct competition. This is what we walk about when we talk about impurities.





TF2, however, with its whitelist, has neither a wide range of weapons or champions (classes), nor an economy. The existence of classes should not be confused for an impurity. First of all, teams run identical class structures the vast majority of the time. Secondly, classes should be thought of as simply packaging the various differences a CS player would get from his armor, his weapon, and his weapon's effect on his mobility. TF2 is an arena game, so these differences are more extreme in an absolute sense than in CS:GO, but relative to the way the TF2 universe works, the difference between the Soldier and the Scout is comparable to the difference between having armor and not, or running around with an AWP or a pistol.





The vital difference is that in TF2, you don't buy Soldiers and Scouts, or Medics and Demomen, and you can't have three scouts or two medics because you have more money. Clockwork and b4nny never have to run out to mid with pistols against their opponent's scatterguns because their team is eco-ing a round. They are always competing directly against their opponents. That is the purity of competitive TF2. Everything is always the same. That allows the actual players to create all of the differences.





Most rounds of CS:GO feature one team having superior equipment than their opponent and some aspect of worrying about preserving equipment. TF2 players never have to back away from a fight to save a sticky launcher. If you don't understand this argument about purity and directness, consider that most CS:GO matches feature multiple rounds where a player chooses not to fight his opponent in order to save his own gun. In these common situations, the game encourages non-competitiveness. Even the best player in the world would be sometimes recommended not to try his hardest to win the round, because of the way the economy works in the game.





LoL is truly ridiculous with the limits it pushes impurities. At least in CS:GO, teams switch sides at the half. In LoL, whatever champion differences exist last through the entire match. Analysts frequently say a given match was won in the pick/ban phase. Consider how ridiculous that is! LoL is a game where it's valid to argue the match was decided before it was played. That's the complete opposite of direct competition. The competition between players was literally prevented by the advantage one team had from their champion selections.





The problem with removing the TF2 whitelist, as some have argued doing, is that it reduces the purity of the game. Weapons differences might add strategy, but in doing so they reduce the direct competition between players. In soccer, the "meta" consists of using 3 center backs or 4, or how you arrange your midfield or strikers, where you play your players. It is not about whether your winger is wearing the clown shoes or the ankleweights. TF2 exists in a similar strategic space. The strategy is where you set up on the map, how you push, where in the team your personnel plays. It's not about having the best weapon.





A version of competitive TF2 where strategy is about gaining advantage with your weapons is a version of competitive TF2 where teams are actively seeking to minimize direct competition between players. In some respect, that's all that strategy is: gaining advantages beyond of skill level. That means the more strategy in a sport, the less direct competition that sport has. In a way, strategy is an impurity. It's all about efficiently and elegantly creating strategic options without adding bullshit like a hundred champions or a hundred weapons.





Compare Tennis and American Football. Tennis of course still has a great deal of strategy, and any fan can recall the way Nadal deliberately attacks Federer's backhand. Boxing is similar. Boxing and Tennis have a ton of strategy. But the NFL, by comparison, has a ton of tons. 90% of the NFL's millions of spectators can understand no more than 10% of the strategic levels the game is operating on, all the myriad the schemes and playcalls. LoL is similar.





Of course, the NFL and LoL are wildly popular. But so are the World Cup and Wimbledon. It is safe to say that competitive TF2 is not wildly popular. That doesn't mean it needs to be changed.





[i]part 2 below[i]

2 #2 aatje 16 Frags – + Part 2: Competitive E-Sports are Video Games First, Sports Second The problem with looking at popular e-sports for advice on the question of "How to make TF2 bigger" is that when we look at CS:GO and LoL, we are not actually looking at the e-sports equivalents of basketball or American Football, we are looking at the e-sports equivalents of the NBA and the NFL. LoL and CS:GO are businesses run by Riot and Valve, which are themselves businesses. They are not e-sports, they are video games. TF2 is the same. They all exist to make money. Basketball does not exist to make money. Soccer does not exist to make money. The NBA and the Premiership do, to an extent, but they also have a distinctly public character or charter which is totally absent from e-sports. LoL makes money by selling champions. CS:GO makes money by selling skins and weapons, but it is not free-to-play. The competitive versions of those games are designed to reinforce features that make money. They are not necessarily designed to be the best competition possible. LoL is by far the worst offender. The level of competition is almost criminally sabotaged by LoL's aggressive patching and the ludicrously large champion pool. Valve's monetization of CS:GO is saintly compared to Riot's of LoL, or even compared to Valv'es own structure in TF2. In CS:GO, you are never at any competitive disadvantage by never spending money on weapons. This is because CS:GO is not free-to-play. That's the trade-off, right there. TF2 is free-to-play. In at least pub servers, Valve highlights all the crazy weapons Valve sells or drops. Random drops give you random weapons, half of which are strictly worse than stock, although new players won't generally be able to discern this. New players don't generally know what pros and cons are significant. They unlikely to know what is actually an upgrade. The Machina looks cool, and it sounds cool, but it takes a day for a new pub player to realize that the laser beam shining from his sniping spot is getting him killed. If he didn't get the weapon for free, he can trade. Valve prides itself on the secondary economy, and talks about how much value they create for their users. What they never talk about is whether the time that new player spends trying to hand off his $4 sniper rifle in exchange for some alternate scattergun is time not spent actually playing the game(!) Valve's Game is one that has a flourishing virtual economy at the direct expense of actual gameplay. If you count time in TF2 spent buying hats time spent playing TF2, you have a weird definition of playing but probably a very accurate definition of TF2. If that new player wants to get his better weapons through random drops and without going to the store, then he has to sink a lot of time into the game all the while playing, by that person's own definition, a competitive disadvantage. During those many hours, he is building an awareness of all the other cosmetic shit Valve has thrown into TF2. Valve's support of competitive DoTA or CS:GO comes from the fact that the competitive versions of the game make them money. Competitive TF2 does not. It's that simple. Others have made this same argument and come to the conclusion that competitive TF2 needs to embrace Valve's game. The problem is that by the argument's admitted logic, you would be making changes to competitive TF2 for reasons other than improving competitive TF2. You are looking to increase the player base. Bigger might sometimes be better, but bigger is definitely never better when enlargening it comes from knowingly making it worse. Worse != Better It is fundamentally wrong, perhaps even immoral, to make changes to a game or sport with the aim of increasing popularity or profit. The sport exists to be the best version of the sport. That's the fundamental difference between e-sports and real sports, although some real sports are equal violators of this principle. Notably, the NFL changed it's version of football to cater to fantasy football, which has become its most important audience. This has led to rule changes that have inflated offensive statistics and diluted the game. Yes, of course these changes are value judgments. It's all aesthetics at some level. You can argue that the NFL is better and more entertaining today than it was ten years ago. The NBA has gone the opposite direction, being true to its sport, relaxing defensive restrictions which led to the stale iso-ball of the Jordan era. The league is stronger and better to watch and follow than ever. Franchise prices and TV money has soared accordingly. So, both approaches can increase popularity. You can increase popularity by improving the game (NBA) or you can increase popularity by making changes that increase popularity (NFL). The reason competitive TF2 is hugely underplayed relative to its quality as an e-sport is that it exists within one of the most ridiculously bloated, impure free-to-play video games currently existing. Valve's Game is more of virtual shopping mall than an actual game. And then within this virtual shopping mall, there's this relatively minimal, pure FPS game, existing in direct contradiction to everything around it. Truly, those who advocate moving towards Valve's Game are asking the question, "How can we make competitive TF2 more accessible and attractive to casual TF2 players?" But they fail to take the next step in that line of questioning. Why would someone who wants to play a competitive video game look to TF2 in the first place? Competitive TF2 is not drawing from other TF2 players. It is drawing from other potential competitive FPS players. These people have a range of choices. Someone who wants to play a competitive FPS wants to play a pure form of FPS. How many people would look at TF2 to provide that? Basic design aesthetics make CS:GO look like the serious, pure game, and TF2 the diverting, casual frolic. And for 99% of TF2 and CS:GO, this holds true. For competitive 6s, however, TF2 is actually purer than CS:GO. It's just that relatively few people looking for something serious wade through the thousand hours of non-competitive TF2 to get there. The problem for competitive TF2 isn't casual player's lack of interest or pub server's, it's other competitive FPS games. If competitive TF2 did the things Valve would need it to do to get Valve's support, you'd lose that competition anyway. People who play competitive CS:GO don't want to play Valve's Game. So, you really can't win. We need to accept that and accept that making competitive 6s as good as possible is way more important than chasing popularity. At the end of the day, there is no "solution" to make competitive TF2 big. It's very existence as a very pure game within the realm of TF2 is almost a paradox. To dilute the quality of the game to chase popularity is ethically wrong and a disservice to the competitive players who are already playing the game. Anyway, Thanks a lot for reading, those who did. [u][b]Part 2: Competitive E-Sports are Video Games First, Sports Second[/b][/u]





The problem with looking at popular e-sports for advice on the question of "How to make TF2 bigger" is that when we look at CS:GO and LoL, we are not actually looking at the e-sports equivalents of basketball or American Football, we are looking at the e-sports equivalents of the NBA and the NFL. LoL and CS:GO are businesses run by Riot and Valve, which are themselves businesses. They are not e-sports, they are video games. TF2 is the same. They all exist to make money. Basketball does not exist to make money. Soccer does not exist to make money. The NBA and the Premiership do, to an extent, but they also have a distinctly public character or charter which is totally absent from e-sports.





LoL makes money by selling champions. CS:GO makes money by selling skins and weapons, but it is not free-to-play. The competitive versions of those games are designed to reinforce features that make money. They are not necessarily designed to be the best competition possible.





LoL is by far the worst offender. The level of competition is almost criminally sabotaged by LoL's aggressive patching and the ludicrously large champion pool. Valve's monetization of CS:GO is saintly compared to Riot's of LoL, or even compared to Valv'es own structure in TF2. In CS:GO, you are never at any competitive disadvantage by never spending money on weapons. This is because CS:GO is not free-to-play. That's the trade-off, right there.





TF2 [i]is[/i] free-to-play. In at least pub servers, Valve highlights all the crazy weapons Valve sells or drops. Random drops give you random weapons, half of which are strictly worse than stock, although new players won't generally be able to discern this. New players don't generally know what pros and cons are significant. They unlikely to know what is actually an upgrade. The Machina looks cool, and it sounds cool, but it takes a day for a new pub player to realize that the laser beam shining from his sniping spot is getting him killed.





If he didn't get the weapon for free, he can trade. Valve prides itself on the secondary economy, and talks about how much value they create for their users. What they never talk about is whether the time that new player spends trying to hand off his $4 sniper rifle in exchange for some alternate scattergun is time not spent actually playing the game(!) Valve's Game is one that has a flourishing virtual economy at the direct expense of actual gameplay. [b]If you count time in TF2 spent buying hats time spent playing TF2, you have a weird definition of playing but probably a very accurate definition of TF2.[/b]





If that new player wants to get his better weapons through random drops and without going to the store, then he has to sink a lot of time into the game all the while playing, by that person's own definition, a competitive disadvantage. During those many hours, he is building an awareness of all the other cosmetic shit Valve has thrown into TF2. Valve's support of competitive DoTA or CS:GO comes from the fact that the competitive versions of the game make them money. Competitive TF2 does not. It's that simple.





Others have made this same argument and come to the conclusion that competitive TF2 needs to embrace Valve's game. The problem is that by the argument's admitted logic, you would be making changes to competitive TF2 for reasons other than improving competitive TF2. You are looking to increase the player base. [b]Bigger might sometimes be better, but bigger is definitely never better when enlargening it comes from knowingly making it worse.[/b] Worse != Better





It is fundamentally wrong, perhaps even immoral, to make changes to a game or sport with the aim of increasing popularity or profit. The sport exists to be the best version of the sport. That's the fundamental difference between e-sports and real sports, although some real sports are equal violators of this principle. Notably, the NFL changed it's version of football to cater to fantasy football, which has become its most important audience. This has led to rule changes that have inflated offensive statistics and diluted the game.





Yes, of course these changes are value judgments. It's all aesthetics at some level. You can argue that the NFL is better and more entertaining today than it was ten years ago. The NBA has gone the opposite direction, being true to its sport, relaxing defensive restrictions which led to the stale iso-ball of the Jordan era. The league is stronger and better to watch and follow than ever. Franchise prices and TV money has soared accordingly.





So, both approaches can increase popularity. You can increase popularity by improving the game (NBA) or you can increase popularity by making changes that increase popularity (NFL).





The reason competitive TF2 is hugely underplayed relative to its quality as an e-sport is that it exists within one of the most ridiculously bloated, impure free-to-play video games currently existing. Valve's Game is more of virtual shopping mall than an actual game. And then within this virtual shopping mall, there's this relatively minimal, pure FPS game, existing in direct contradiction to everything around it.





Truly, those who advocate moving towards Valve's Game are asking the question, "How can we make competitive TF2 more accessible and attractive to casual TF2 players?" But they fail to take the next step in that line of questioning. [b]Why would someone who wants to play a competitive video game look to TF2 in the first place?[/b]





Competitive TF2 is not drawing from other TF2 players. It is drawing from other potential competitive FPS players. These people have a range of choices. Someone who wants to play a competitive FPS wants to play a pure form of FPS. How many people would look at TF2 to provide that? Basic design aesthetics make CS:GO look like the serious, pure game, and TF2 the diverting, casual frolic. And for 99% of TF2 and CS:GO, this holds true. For competitive 6s, however, TF2 is actually purer than CS:GO. It's just that relatively few people looking for something serious wade through the thousand hours of non-competitive TF2 to get there. The problem for competitive TF2 isn't casual player's lack of interest or pub server's, it's other competitive FPS games. If competitive TF2 did the things Valve would need it to do to get Valve's support, you'd lose that competition anyway. People who play competitive CS:GO don't want to play Valve's Game. So, you really can't win. We need to accept that and accept that making competitive 6s as good as possible is way more important than chasing popularity.





At the end of the day, there is no "solution" to make competitive TF2 big. It's very existence as a very pure game within the realm of TF2 is almost a paradox. To dilute the quality of the game to chase popularity is ethically wrong and a disservice to the competitive players who are already playing the game.





Anyway, Thanks a lot for reading, those who did.

3 #3 Royce 21 Frags – + I don't think you need 2000 words to defend the whitelist. Fact: Valve makes mostly terrible weapons that break the game. The end. I don't think you need 2000 words to defend the whitelist. Fact: Valve makes mostly terrible weapons that break the game. The end.

4 #4 Bonafide -25 Frags – + I can't actually believe, a single person would do this, for nothing??? I can't actually believe, a single person would do this, for nothing???

6 #6 hooli 13 Frags – + very well written man, i agree with everything you said and you put it together better than i ever could very well written man, i agree with everything you said and you put it together better than i ever could

7 #7 GentlemanJon 9 Frags – + You'd be better off citing specific arguments by individuals and addressing them than saying things like "Others" and "those that" because you're misrepresenting complex and nuanced arguments simply to suit your own. You'd be better off citing specific arguments by individuals and addressing them than saying things like "Others" and "those that" because you're misrepresenting complex and nuanced arguments simply to suit your own.

8 #8 DayNife 5 Frags – + You make a lot of great points, and I agree with a lot of what you say, but I don't believe that TF2's competitive scene is completely disconnected from its casual. Personally, I started playing competitive as a direct result of playing in pubs and I don't really see the appeal in a game such as CS:GO. The features that make TF2 unique for me at least (movement-based close-range combat) are pretty much the same in both competitive and pubs. I think there's a huge pool of players in the casual scene that would love to get into competitive TF2, and not something like CS:GO. You make a lot of great points, and I agree with a lot of what you say, but I don't believe that TF2's competitive scene is completely disconnected from its casual. Personally, I started playing competitive as a direct result of playing in pubs and I don't really see the appeal in a game such as CS:GO. The features that make TF2 unique for me at least (movement-based close-range combat) are pretty much the same in both competitive and pubs. I think there's a huge pool of players in the casual scene that would love to get into competitive TF2, and not something like CS:GO.

9 #9 THEBILLDOZER 0 Frags – + can we just have a bot that constant'y makes lobbies im tf2center or somethimg with an open whitelist so people that dont understand can find out for themselves so they domt have to make long winded posts like yesterday? can we just have a bot that constant'y makes lobbies im tf2center or somethimg with an open whitelist so people that dont understand can find out for themselves so they domt have to make long winded posts like yesterday?

10 #10 trucker 1 Frags – + i am not pure my parents did not baptise me because they believe that religion should not be forced upon others i am not pure my parents did not baptise me because they believe that religion should not be forced upon others

11 #11 HueyLewis 7 Frags – + trucker i am not pure my parents did not baptise me because they believe that religion should not be forced upon others aww man you're going to hell [quote=trucker]i am not pure my parents did not baptise me because they believe that religion should not be forced upon others[/quote]



aww man you're going to hell

12 #12 Iso 21 Frags – + dokidokipanic can we just have a bot that constant'y makes lobbies im tf2center or somethimg with an open whitelist so people that dont understand can find out for themselves so they domt have to make long winded posts like yesterday? But that bot already exists, its name is Thief. [quote=dokidokipanic]can we just have a bot that constant'y makes lobbies im tf2center or somethimg with an open whitelist so people that dont understand can find out for themselves so they domt have to make long winded posts like yesterday?[/quote]

But that bot already exists, its name is Thief.

13 #13 jake_ 2 Frags – + Really well written. To the people that will inevitably indict some points as straw men, his explanation of the argument for "valves game" are pretty fair. I doubt that many people above low level comp really believe that unlocks make the game more competitive. Really well written. To the people that will inevitably indict some points as straw men, his explanation of the argument for "valves game" are pretty fair. I doubt that many people above low level comp really believe that unlocks make the game more competitive.

14 #14 hooli 0 Frags – + you'd be surprised you'd be [url=http://teamfortress.tv/thread/16585/thoughts-on-blackbox-and-shotgun-roam/?page=3#81]surprised[/url]

16 #16 DanceNumber 4 Frags – + How many idiots will continue to make threads thread saying 'how we need to fix things' or 'how we should change the game' or 'save tf2' or 'tf2 is dead'. Shits not productive at all, its just annoying. We've done 7 years of thinking about the way the game should be played, and the way it should be done. As competitors and players we've found something at works FOR TF2, and thats the best it's ever gonna be. How many idiots will continue to make threads thread saying 'how we need to fix things' or 'how we should change the game' or 'save tf2' or 'tf2 is dead'. Shits not productive at all, its just annoying. We've done 7 years of thinking about the way the game should be played, and the way it should be done. As competitors and players we've found something at works FOR TF2, and thats the best it's ever gonna be.

17 #17 Crayboff -1 Frags – + I apologize in advance, my response will span over multiple posts. aatje We see this exact sort of approach in the popular MOBAs. League of Legends has more than a hundred champions, each with different abilities, strengths and weaknesses... Just as in the absurd soccer hypothetical, direct competition between human beings is reduced by all this other stuff, by these impurities.



CS:GO is impure in a different way. CS:GO has a variety of weapons and grenades, but FPS's probably need a variety. Rather, CS is impure because of its economy. The economy reduces direct competition between players because in a majority of rounds teams do not have equal or equivalent equipment. This means not only are the players competing against each other, the guns and grenades are competing against each other. Just like the champions, or the random crap in the soccer hypothetical, the presence of additional factors is cluttering and crowding out direct competition. This is what we walk about when we talk about impurities. CS:GO and LoL may both be "impure" but you're missing the biggest point. They've gotten MUCH more popular than TF2 both in casual comp and in tourney play. Those are two of the biggest e-sports of all time so obviously "purity" isn't stopping people from having fun playing it. E-sports are different from real sports, which I will go into more later. aatje The vital difference is that in TF2, you don't buy Soldiers and Scouts, or Medics and Demomen, and you can't have three scouts or two medics because you have more money. Clockwork and b4nny never have to run out to mid with pistols against their opponent's scatterguns because their team is eco-ing a round. They are always competing directly against their opponents. That is the purity of competitive TF2. Everything is always the same. That allows the actual players to create all of the differences. Perhaps one of the most telling issues with "everything is always the same" is that once things are strategies are standardized things don't usually change that much. I'm one of the people who can appreciate the slight differences made by individual skill, but a large majority of the audience can't see that in every single game. Sure they may appreciate skill, but after you've watched hundreds of casts it really does start looking very repetitive. I don't blame anyone for getting bored watching a game that doesn't leave too much room for innovation. When developing a strong e-sport, one of the most important things you can do is I'll discuss at least one reason why real life sports can get away with it later. aatje Most rounds of CS:GO feature one team having superior equipment than their opponent and some aspect of worrying about preserving equipment. TF2 players never have to back away from a fight to save a sticky launcher. If you don't understand this argument about purity and directness, consider that most CS:GO matches feature multiple rounds where a player chooses not to fight his opponent in order to save his own gun. In these common situations, the game encourages non-competitiveness. Even the best player in the world would be sometimes recommended not to try his hardest to win the round, because of the way the economy works in the game. I disagree with this point completely. You'll frequently have TF2 players backing off of fights so they can defend the next point. Dying puts a player completely out of play for quite a few seconds which can be a huge penalty just as losing powerful weapons in CS:GO can be. Even the best medic or demo in the world will be recommended to back off from a lost mid-fight to help stop the enemy from rolling quickly to last, because of the way respawn timers works in the game. aatje LoL is truly ridiculous with the limits it pushes impurities. At least in CS:GO, teams switch sides at the half. In LoL, whatever champion differences exist last through the entire match. Analysts frequently say a given match was won in the pick/ban phase. Consider how ridiculous that is! LoL is a game where it's valid to argue the match was decided before it was played. That's the complete opposite of direct competition. The competition between players was literally prevented by the advantage one team had from their champion selections. But LoL is one of the most successful e-sports of all time. Its "impurity" is obviously not stopping people from having fun playing it. aatje A version of competitive TF2 where strategy is about gaining advantage with your weapons is a version of competitive TF2 where teams are actively seeking to minimize direct competition between players. In some respect, that's all that strategy is: gaining advantages beyond of skill level. That means the more strategy in a sport, the less direct competition that sport has. In a way, strategy is an impurity. It's all about efficiently and elegantly creating strategic options without adding bullshit like a hundred champions or a hundred weapons. Regardless of how many champions or weapons you add, people will still choose which are best in a certain situation. The second a meta is established (which happens really, really quickly), the game goes back to being about the players' individual skill and ability to adapt. aatje Compare Tennis and American Football. Tennis of course still has a great deal of strategy, and any fan can recall the way Nadal deliberately attacks Federer's backhand. Boxing is similar. Boxing and Tennis have a ton of strategy. But the NFL, by comparison, has a ton of tons. 90% of the NFL's millions of spectators can understand no more than 10% of the strategic levels the game is operating on, all the myriad the schemes and playcalls. LoL is similar.



Of course, the NFL and LoL are wildly popular. But so are the World Cup and Wimbledon. It is safe to say that competitive TF2 is not wildly popular. That doesn't mean it needs to be changed. Real life sports are popular largely because love for the game is handed down from one generation to the next. Those who have fathers who love watching baseball will most likely love baseball themselves. Real life sports become a lot more just the game itself, from the audience side of things (which is arguably the most important aspect of things like the NFL) the game isn't so much about an individual person's skill or "pure" gameplay as it is generating experiences and memories with close friends and family. Sports are a cultural phenomenon that lasts and grows through generations. Video games literally just do not last long enough for that to happen. New games come out very frequently and those that have stuck around (Counter Strike, TF2, Starcraft) have only been around for 10 years. They have only reached any sembelence of popularity in the west during the last 3-4 years which isn't enough time to grow up with it then pass it down to your children. When e-sports become an ingrained aspect of a widespread culture experience, that's when you can deal with "purity" and your "purity" arguments start taking hold. Until then, it only limits innovation and growth in a field that has a lot of competition. Products and businesses don't last long in the world if they only cater to their small niche and don't constantly work to evolve and improve on themselves. Real life sports and e-sports are entirely different beasts at the moment. It is idiocy to ignore decisions that are successful in e-sports just because you disagree with them. I apologize in advance, my response will span over multiple posts.



[quote=aatje]

We see this exact sort of approach in the popular MOBAs. League of Legends has more than a hundred champions, each with different abilities, strengths and weaknesses... Just as in the absurd soccer hypothetical, direct competition between human beings is reduced by all this other stuff, by these impurities.



CS:GO is impure in a different way. CS:GO has a variety of weapons and grenades, but FPS's probably need a variety. Rather, CS is impure because of its economy. The economy reduces direct competition between players because in a majority of rounds teams do not have equal or equivalent equipment. This means not only are the players competing against each other, the guns and grenades are competing against each other. Just like the champions, or the random crap in the soccer hypothetical, the presence of additional factors is cluttering and crowding out direct competition. This is what we walk about when we talk about impurities.[/quote]



CS:GO and LoL may both be "impure" but you're missing the biggest point. They've gotten MUCH more popular than TF2 both in casual comp and in tourney play. Those are two of the biggest e-sports of all time so obviously "purity" isn't stopping people from having fun playing it. E-sports are different from real sports, which I will go into more later.



[quote=aatje]

The vital difference is that in TF2, you don't buy Soldiers and Scouts, or Medics and Demomen, and you can't have three scouts or two medics because you have more money. Clockwork and b4nny never have to run out to mid with pistols against their opponent's scatterguns because their team is eco-ing a round. They are always competing directly against their opponents. That is the purity of competitive TF2. Everything is always the same. That allows the actual players to create all of the differences.[/quote]



Perhaps one of the most telling issues with "everything is always the same" is that once things are strategies are standardized things don't usually change that much. I'm one of the people who can appreciate the slight differences made by individual skill, but a large majority of the audience can't see that in every single game. Sure they may appreciate skill, but after you've watched hundreds of casts it really does start looking very repetitive. I don't blame anyone for getting bored watching a game that doesn't leave too much room for innovation. When developing a strong e-sport, one of the most important things you can do is



I'll discuss at least one reason why real life sports can get away with it later.



[quote=aatje]

Most rounds of CS:GO feature one team having superior equipment than their opponent and some aspect of worrying about preserving equipment. TF2 players never have to back away from a fight to save a sticky launcher. If you don't understand this argument about purity and directness, consider that most CS:GO matches feature multiple rounds where a player chooses not to fight his opponent in order to save his own gun. In these common situations, the game encourages non-competitiveness. Even the best player in the world would be sometimes recommended not to try his hardest to win the round, because of the way the economy works in the game.[/quote]



I disagree with this point completely. You'll frequently have TF2 players backing off of fights so they can defend the next point. Dying puts a player completely out of play for quite a few seconds which can be a huge penalty just as losing powerful weapons in CS:GO can be. Even the best medic or demo in the world will be recommended to back off from a lost mid-fight to help stop the enemy from rolling quickly to last, because of the way respawn timers works in the game.



[quote=aatje]

LoL is truly ridiculous with the limits it pushes impurities. At least in CS:GO, teams switch sides at the half. In LoL, whatever champion differences exist last through the entire match. Analysts frequently say a given match was won in the pick/ban phase. Consider how ridiculous that is! LoL is a game where it's valid to argue the match was decided before it was played. That's the complete opposite of direct competition. The competition between players was literally prevented by the advantage one team had from their champion selections.

[/quote]



But LoL is one of the most successful e-sports of all time. Its "impurity" is obviously not stopping people from having fun playing it.



[quote=aatje]

A version of competitive TF2 where strategy is about gaining advantage with your weapons is a version of competitive TF2 where teams are actively seeking to minimize direct competition between players. In some respect, that's all that strategy is: gaining advantages beyond of skill level. That means the more strategy in a sport, the less direct competition that sport has. In a way, strategy is an impurity. It's all about efficiently and elegantly creating strategic options without adding bullshit like a hundred champions or a hundred weapons.[/quote]



Regardless of how many champions or weapons you add, people will still choose which are best in a certain situation. The second a meta is established (which happens really, really quickly), the game goes back to being about the players' individual skill and ability to adapt.



[quote=aatje]

Compare Tennis and American Football. Tennis of course still has a great deal of strategy, and any fan can recall the way Nadal deliberately attacks Federer's backhand. Boxing is similar. Boxing and Tennis have a ton of strategy. But the NFL, by comparison, has a ton of tons. 90% of the NFL's millions of spectators can understand no more than 10% of the strategic levels the game is operating on, all the myriad the schemes and playcalls. LoL is similar.





Of course, the NFL and LoL are wildly popular. But so are the World Cup and Wimbledon. It is safe to say that competitive TF2 is not wildly popular. That doesn't mean it needs to be changed.[/quote]



Real life sports are popular largely because love for the game is handed down from one generation to the next. Those who have fathers who love watching baseball will most likely love baseball themselves. Real life sports become a lot more just the game itself, from the audience side of things (which is arguably the most important aspect of things like the NFL) the game isn't so much about an individual person's skill or "pure" gameplay as it is generating experiences and memories with close friends and family. Sports are a cultural phenomenon that lasts and grows through generations.



Video games literally just do not last long enough for that to happen. New games come out very frequently and those that have stuck around (Counter Strike, TF2, Starcraft) have only been around for 10 years. They have only reached any sembelence of popularity in the west during the last 3-4 years which isn't enough time to grow up with it then pass it down to your children. When e-sports become an ingrained aspect of a widespread culture experience, that's when you can deal with "purity" and your "purity" arguments start taking hold.



Until then, it only limits innovation and growth in a field that has a lot of competition. Products and businesses don't last long in the world if they only cater to their small niche and don't constantly work to evolve and improve on themselves.



Real life sports and e-sports are entirely different beasts at the moment. It is idiocy to ignore decisions that are successful in e-sports just because you disagree with them.

18 #18 DanceNumber 7 Frags – + lmao these nerd essays lmao these nerd essays

19 #19 Crayboff -1 Frags – + continued: aatje The problem with looking at popular e-sports for advice on the question of "How to make TF2 bigger" is that when we look at CS:GO and LoL, we are not actually looking at the e-sports equivalents of basketball or American Football, we are looking at the e-sports equivalents of the NBA and the NFL. LoL and CS:GO are businesses run by Riot and Valve, which are themselves businesses. They are not e-sports, they are video games. TF2 is the same. They all exist to make money. Basketball does not exist to make money. Soccer does not exist to make money. The NBA and the Premiership do, to an extent, but they also have a distinctly public character or charter which is totally absent from e-sports. Every single successful sport you have mentioned are ones that only thrive because of the cultural phenomenon that I mentioned above. That's what the "public character or charter" thing is you're talking about. aatje LoL makes money by selling champions. CS:GO makes money by selling skins and weapons, but it is not free-to-play. The competitive versions of those games are designed to reinforce features that make money. They are not necessarily designed to be the best competition possible.



LoL is by far the worst offender. The level of competition is almost criminally sabotaged by LoL's aggressive patching and the ludicrously large champion pool. Valve's monetization of CS:GO is saintly compared to Riot's of LoL, or even compared to Valv'es own structure in TF2. LoL is played at a hugely competitive level. Certainly they make money off people buying champions and sure they might improve some people's experiences if they didn't require people to purchase the champions. But that doesn't make the gameplay itself any less competitive. That doesn't stop people from wanting to play the game or stop them from running in droves to watch high level competitive play. Merely pointing at the success of the game and its competitive community has been is enough evidence to show that, in general, people don't see LoL as an uncompetitive money grab you seem to be suggesting. aatje If he didn't get the weapon for free, he can trade. Valve prides itself on the secondary economy, and talks about how much value they create for their users. What they never talk about is whether the time that new player spends trying to hand off his $4 sniper rifle in exchange for some alternate scattergun is time not spent actually playing the game(!) Valve's Game is one that has a flourishing virtual economy at the direct expense of actual gameplay. If you count time in TF2 spent buying hats time spent playing TF2, you have a weird definition of playing but probably a very accurate definition of TF2.



If that new player wants to get his better weapons through random drops and without going to the store, then he has to sink a lot of time into the game all the while playing, by that person's own definition, a competitive disadvantage. During those many hours, he is building an awareness of all the other cosmetic shit Valve has thrown into TF2. Valve's support of competitive DoTA or CS:GO comes from the fact that the competitive versions of the game make them money. Competitive TF2 does not. It's that simple. If there is one thing that TF2 is applauded for over just about any other game with weapon unlocks, it's that its stock weapons rarely give you a disadvantage. Sure there are some that are a little bit better, there are very stock weapons that are just plain bad. aatje In CS:GO, you are never at any competitive disadvantage by never spending money on weapons. This is because CS:GO is not free-to-play. That's the trade-off, right there. Your arguement is that because you have to pay to play CS:GO, it is competitive. But because you have to pay to play TF2 and LoL competitively, it's not competitive? You're paying all of these situations while at the same time letting casual players who don't care about comp to experience the game. Plus, it is a LOT cheaper to purchase every single TF2 weapon, not to mention just the good ones used in competitive, from the community store than it is to buy CS:GO itself. aatje Others have made this same argument and come to the conclusion that competitive TF2 needs to embrace Valve's game. The problem is that by the argument's admitted logic, you would be making changes to competitive TF2 for reasons other than improving competitive TF2. You are looking to increase the player base. Bigger might sometimes be better, but bigger is definitely never better when enlargening it comes from knowingly making it worse. Worse != Better The point of "Valve's Game" was to explore whether or not all of the disallowed weapons should be left disallowed. If you watched the games and read the feedback, you'll see that there were only a very small few weapons that actually made gameplay less fun for the players (quickfix and BFB were really the only two that made any sort of difference in those games). What it showed was that not every weapon is great for competitive, but at the same time that doesn't mean we should be so quick to write off more weapons just because it's "impure". Also the worst thing you can do when trying to grow a community (which you need to constantly do if you want the community to survive, you need new blood to replace those who inevitably get burnt out and to bring fresh ideas into the mix) is to limit it to please a small niche of players. "Impurity" as proven by LoL and CS:GO doesn't necessarily mean that it is making the game worse. aatje It is fundamentally wrong, perhaps even immoral, to make changes to a game or sport with the aim of increasing popularity or profit. The sport exists to be the best version of the sport. That's the fundamental difference between e-sports and real sports, although some real sports are equal violators of this principle. Notably, the NFL changed it's version of football to cater to fantasy football, which has become its most important audience. This has led to rule changes that have inflated offensive statistics and diluted the game.



Yes, of course these changes are value judgments. It's all aesthetics at some level. You can argue that the NFL is better and more entertaining today than it was ten years ago. The NBA has gone the opposite direction, being true to its sport, relaxing defensive restrictions which led to the stale iso-ball of the Jordan era. The league is stronger and better to watch and follow than ever. Franchise prices and TV money has soared accordingly.



So, both approaches can increase popularity. You can increase popularity by improving the game (NBA) or you can increase popularity by making changes that increase popularity (NFL). I hate being that guy, but your arguments are entirely subjective and come from a place where change is feared. A change that leads to more popularity means that change was considered a good change for a lot more people than those who didn't think it was a good idea. Sure some changes can make a game less fun and less popular, but that doesn't mean that change is bad. continued:



[quote=aatje]

The problem with looking at popular e-sports for advice on the question of "How to make TF2 bigger" is that when we look at CS:GO and LoL, we are not actually looking at the e-sports equivalents of basketball or American Football, we are looking at the e-sports equivalents of the NBA and the NFL. LoL and CS:GO are businesses run by Riot and Valve, which are themselves businesses. They are not e-sports, they are video games. TF2 is the same. They all exist to make money. Basketball does not exist to make money. Soccer does not exist to make money. The NBA and the Premiership do, to an extent, but they also have a distinctly public character or charter which is totally absent from e-sports.[/quote]



Every single successful sport you have mentioned are ones that only thrive because of the cultural phenomenon that I mentioned above. That's what the "public character or charter" thing is you're talking about.



[quote=aatje]

LoL makes money by selling champions. CS:GO makes money by selling skins and weapons, but it is not free-to-play. The competitive versions of those games are designed to reinforce features that make money. They are not necessarily designed to be the best competition possible.



LoL is by far the worst offender. The level of competition is almost criminally sabotaged by LoL's aggressive patching and the ludicrously large champion pool. Valve's monetization of CS:GO is saintly compared to Riot's of LoL, or even compared to Valv'es own structure in TF2.[/quote]



LoL is played at a hugely competitive level. Certainly they make money off people buying champions and sure they might improve some people's experiences if they didn't require people to purchase the champions. But that doesn't make the gameplay itself any less competitive. That doesn't stop people from wanting to play the game or stop them from running in droves to watch high level competitive play. Merely pointing at the success of the game and its competitive community has been is enough evidence to show that, in general, people don't see LoL as an uncompetitive money grab you seem to be suggesting.



[quote=aatje]

If he didn't get the weapon for free, he can trade. Valve prides itself on the secondary economy, and talks about how much value they create for their users. What they never talk about is whether the time that new player spends trying to hand off his $4 sniper rifle in exchange for some alternate scattergun is time not spent actually playing the game(!) Valve's Game is one that has a flourishing virtual economy at the direct expense of actual gameplay. [b]If you count time in TF2 spent buying hats time spent playing TF2, you have a weird definition of playing but probably a very accurate definition of TF2.[/b]





If that new player wants to get his better weapons through random drops and without going to the store, then he has to sink a lot of time into the game all the while playing, by that person's own definition, a competitive disadvantage. During those many hours, he is building an awareness of all the other cosmetic shit Valve has thrown into TF2. Valve's support of competitive DoTA or CS:GO comes from the fact that the competitive versions of the game make them money. Competitive TF2 does not. It's that simple.[/quote]



If there is one thing that TF2 is applauded for over just about any other game with weapon unlocks, it's that its stock weapons rarely give you a disadvantage. Sure there are some that are a little bit better, there are very stock weapons that are just plain bad.



[quote=aatje]In CS:GO, you are never at any competitive disadvantage by never spending money on weapons. This is because CS:GO is not free-to-play. That's the trade-off, right there.[/quote]



Your arguement is that because you have to pay to play CS:GO, it is competitive. But because you have to pay to play TF2 and LoL competitively, it's not competitive? You're paying all of these situations while at the same time letting casual players who don't care about comp to experience the game. Plus, it is a LOT cheaper to purchase every single TF2 weapon, not to mention just the good ones used in competitive, from the community store than it is to buy CS:GO itself.



[quote=aatje]

Others have made this same argument and come to the conclusion that competitive TF2 needs to embrace Valve's game. The problem is that by the argument's admitted logic, you would be making changes to competitive TF2 for reasons other than improving competitive TF2. You are looking to increase the player base. [b]Bigger might sometimes be better, but bigger is definitely never better when enlargening it comes from knowingly making it worse.[/b] Worse != Better[/quote]



The point of "Valve's Game" was to explore whether or not all of the disallowed weapons should be left disallowed. If you watched the games and read the feedback, you'll see that there were only a very small few weapons that actually made gameplay less fun for the players (quickfix and BFB were really the only two that made any sort of difference in those games). What it showed was that not every weapon is great for competitive, but at the same time that doesn't mean we should be so quick to write off more weapons just because it's "impure".



Also the worst thing you can do when trying to grow a community (which you need to constantly do if you want the community to survive, you need new blood to replace those who inevitably get burnt out and to bring fresh ideas into the mix) is to limit it to please a small niche of players. "Impurity" as proven by LoL and CS:GO doesn't necessarily mean that it is making the game worse.



[quote=aatje]

It is fundamentally wrong, perhaps even immoral, to make changes to a game or sport with the aim of increasing popularity or profit. The sport exists to be the best version of the sport. That's the fundamental difference between e-sports and real sports, although some real sports are equal violators of this principle. Notably, the NFL changed it's version of football to cater to fantasy football, which has become its most important audience. This has led to rule changes that have inflated offensive statistics and diluted the game.



Yes, of course these changes are value judgments. It's all aesthetics at some level. You can argue that the NFL is better and more entertaining today than it was ten years ago. The NBA has gone the opposite direction, being true to its sport, relaxing defensive restrictions which led to the stale iso-ball of the Jordan era. The league is stronger and better to watch and follow than ever. Franchise prices and TV money has soared accordingly.





So, both approaches can increase popularity. You can increase popularity by improving the game (NBA) or you can increase popularity by making changes that increase popularity (NFL).[/quote]



I hate being that guy, but your arguments are entirely subjective and come from a place where change is feared. A change that leads to more popularity means that change was considered a good change for a lot more people than those who didn't think it was a good idea. Sure some changes can make a game less fun and less popular, but that doesn't mean that change is bad.

20 #20 Crayboff -1 Frags – + aatje The reason competitive TF2 is hugely underplayed relative to its quality as an e-sport is that it exists within one of the most ridiculously bloated, impure free-to-play video games currently existing. Valve's Game is more of virtual shopping mall than an actual game. And then within this virtual shopping mall, there's this relatively minimal, pure FPS game, existing in direct contradiction to everything around it. No, there are several reasons why competitive TF2 isn't popular, but this "purity" argument has nothing to do with it. Both poster childs of "impurity", in your expressed opinion, are two of the most massively popular esports there are. If "impure" games can be very popular, than how in the world can the "impurity" be what is limiting TF2? aatje Truly, those who advocate moving towards Valve's Game are asking the question, "How can we make competitive TF2 more accessible and attractive to casual TF2 players?" But they fail to take the next step in that line of questioning. Why would someone who wants to play a competitive video game look to TF2 in the first place?



Competitive TF2 is not drawing from other TF2 players. It is drawing from other potential competitive FPS players. Well that's not entirely true. I hate most almost every FPS out there, but love TF2. Being a TF2 player is what got me into competitive. I can name a dozen other friends who feel the same way. Also people don't devote a thousands of hours into a game just because it's a FPS but rather because they enjoy it. You don't go into comp in any game merely because it's an FPS. aatje The problem for competitive TF2 isn't casual player's lack of interest or pub server's, it's other competitive FPS games. If competitive TF2 did the things Valve would need it to do to get Valve's support, you'd lose that competition anyway. People who play competitive CS:GO don't want to play Valve's Game. So, you really can't win. We need to accept that and accept that making competitive 6s as good as possible is way more important than chasing popularity. Developing a scene for only the most hardcore is the best way to put a death sentence on it. People inevitably get burnt out and if you don't have a steady influx of fresh blood to take their spot or bring fresh ideas then you inevitably run out of people who are willing to play. aatje At the end of the day, there is no "solution" to make competitive TF2 big. It's very existence as a very pure game within the realm of TF2 is almost a paradox. To dilute the quality of the game to chase popularity is ethically wrong and a disservice to the competitive players who are already playing the game. "dilute the quality of the game" Again, this is an argument that fears change and fear only leads to limitation and alienation. If you design a scene for a hardcore niche, it can never ever grow and become big. Accessibility is probably the most important hurdle for e-sports (as the video below goes into in detail) and tf2 already suffers from huge problems of inaccessibilty. Focusing on making the game more "pure" or focusing on limiting the player pool only will make this problem more apparent. At the very least, please watch this Extra Credits discussion on what pro gaming needs in order to be successful. While you're watching it, please keep in mind that the consistency he talks about isn't the same thing as the "purity" you have discussed in this thread. Instead, consistency means the that the competitive game isn't hugely altered from regular gameplay and that it stays with a single game instead of changing to new ones every few years. TLDR; Fear of change and improvement leads to stagnation. Refusing to make the game more accessible to new players in an attempt to keep the game more "pure" is the best way to put a death sentence on a scene. ------- Whoops, this didn't look nearly as long while I was typing it up in notepad, sorry guys! [quote=aatje]

The reason competitive TF2 is hugely underplayed relative to its quality as an e-sport is that it exists within one of the most ridiculously bloated, impure free-to-play video games currently existing. Valve's Game is more of virtual shopping mall than an actual game. And then within this virtual shopping mall, there's this relatively minimal, pure FPS game, existing in direct contradiction to everything around it.[/quote]



No, there are several reasons why competitive TF2 isn't popular, but this "purity" argument has nothing to do with it. Both poster childs of "impurity", in your expressed opinion, are two of the most massively popular esports there are. If "impure" games can be very popular, than how in the world can the "impurity" be what is limiting TF2?



[quote=aatje]

Truly, those who advocate moving towards Valve's Game are asking the question, "How can we make competitive TF2 more accessible and attractive to casual TF2 players?" But they fail to take the next step in that line of questioning. [b]Why would someone who wants to play a competitive video game look to TF2 in the first place?[/b]





Competitive TF2 is not drawing from other TF2 players. It is drawing from other potential competitive FPS players.[/quote]



Well that's not entirely true. I hate most almost every FPS out there, but love TF2. Being a TF2 player is what got me into competitive. I can name a dozen other friends who feel the same way. Also people don't devote a thousands of hours into a game just because it's a FPS but rather because they enjoy it. You don't go into comp in any game merely because it's an FPS.



[quote=aatje]

The problem for competitive TF2 isn't casual player's lack of interest or pub server's, it's other competitive FPS games. If competitive TF2 did the things Valve would need it to do to get Valve's support, you'd lose that competition anyway. People who play competitive CS:GO don't want to play Valve's Game. So, you really can't win. We need to accept that and accept that making competitive 6s as good as possible is way more important than chasing popularity.[/quote]



Developing a scene for only the most hardcore is the best way to put a death sentence on it. People inevitably get burnt out and if you don't have a steady influx of fresh blood to take their spot or bring fresh ideas then you inevitably run out of people who are willing to play.



[quote=aatje]

At the end of the day, there is no "solution" to make competitive TF2 big. It's very existence as a very pure game within the realm of TF2 is almost a paradox. To dilute the quality of the game to chase popularity is ethically wrong and a disservice to the competitive players who are already playing the game.[/quote]



"dilute the quality of the game" Again, this is an argument that fears change and fear only leads to limitation and alienation. If you design a scene for a hardcore niche, it can never ever grow and become big. Accessibility is probably the most important hurdle for e-sports (as the video below goes into in detail) and tf2 already suffers from huge problems of inaccessibilty. Focusing on making the game more "pure" or focusing on limiting the player pool only will make this problem more apparent.



At the very least, please watch this [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MKGDealc3eE]Extra Credits discussion on what pro gaming needs in order to be successful[/url]. While you're watching it, please keep in mind that the consistency he talks about isn't the same thing as the "purity" you have discussed in this thread. Instead, consistency means the that the competitive game isn't hugely altered from regular gameplay and that it stays with a single game instead of changing to new ones every few years.



TLDR; Fear of change and improvement leads to stagnation. Refusing to make the game more accessible to new players in an attempt to keep the game more "pure" is the best way to put a death sentence on a scene.



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Whoops, this didn't look nearly as long while I was typing it up in notepad, sorry guys!

21 #21 downpour 1 Frags – + Instead, consistency means the that the game isn't hugely altered from regular gameplay and that it stays with a single game instead of changing to new ones every few years.



TLDR; Fear of change and improvement leads to stagnation. Refusing to make the game more accessible to new players in an attempt to keep the game more "pure" is the best way to put a death sentence on a scene. i dont understand how you can hold both these ideas since releasing new weapons is essentially changing the game [quote]Instead, consistency means the that the game isn't hugely altered from regular gameplay and that it stays with a single game instead of changing to new ones every few years.



TLDR; Fear of change and improvement leads to stagnation. Refusing to make the game more accessible to new players in an attempt to keep the game more "pure" is the best way to put a death sentence on a scene.[/quote]

i dont understand how you can hold both these ideas since releasing new weapons is essentially changing the game

22 #22 Crayboff -2 Frags – + downpour Instead, consistency means the that the game isn't hugely altered from regular gameplay and that it stays with a single game instead of changing to new ones every few years.



TLDR; Fear of change and improvement leads to stagnation. Refusing to make the game more accessible to new players in an attempt to keep the game more "pure" is the best way to put a death sentence on a scene. i dont understand how you can hold both these ideas since releasing new weapons is essentially changing the game What I mean is by the game isn't altered from regular gameplay is that competitive and casual play is similar and consistent. When new weapons are added, you have to try to adapt the scene to those new weapons if possible. I'm not saying every single weapon should be whitelisted, but the scene should allow for the game to move in that direction instead of vehemently trying to stick to "pure" gameplay. I'll update my post to clarify that. [quote=downpour][quote]Instead, consistency means the that the game isn't hugely altered from regular gameplay and that it stays with a single game instead of changing to new ones every few years.



TLDR; Fear of change and improvement leads to stagnation. Refusing to make the game more accessible to new players in an attempt to keep the game more "pure" is the best way to put a death sentence on a scene.[/quote]

i dont understand how you can hold both these ideas since releasing new weapons is essentially changing the game[/quote]





What I mean is by the game isn't altered from regular gameplay is that competitive and casual play is similar and consistent. When new weapons are added, you have to try to adapt the scene to those new weapons if possible. I'm not saying every single weapon should be whitelisted, but the scene should allow for the game to move in that direction instead of vehemently trying to stick to "pure" gameplay.



I'll update my post to clarify that.

23 #23 downpour 11 Frags – + idk, what interested me in tf2 wasnt the regular updates, or the unlockable weapons, or the new game modes that valve rolls out once in a while; its the character design, the art style, the class system, how you can tell what everything is when you see it, and the different movement of each class.

i dont think forcing new weapons into competitive will make the game anymore interesting to pubbers, if they play tf2 because of a few unlocks they'll probably have more fun in HL or pubs anyway.

the only upside of different unlocks i can think of is that it allows for more "styles" of play, but too many different unlocks and it becomes a huge game of rock paper scissors. idk, what interested me in tf2 wasnt the regular updates, or the unlockable weapons, or the new game modes that valve rolls out once in a while; its the character design, the art style, the class system, how you can tell what everything is when you see it, and the different movement of each class.

i dont think forcing new weapons into competitive will make the game anymore interesting to pubbers, if they play tf2 because of a few unlocks they'll probably have more fun in HL or pubs anyway.

the only upside of different unlocks i can think of is that it allows for more "styles" of play, but too many different unlocks and it becomes a huge game of rock paper scissors.

24 #24 bowswer5 2 Frags – + Crayboff What I mean is by the game isn't altered from regular gameplay is that competitive and casual play is similar and consistent. When new weapons are added, you have to try to adapt the scene to those new weapons if possible. I'm not saying every single weapon should be whitelisted, but the scene should allow for the game to move in that direction instead of vehemently trying to stick to "pure" gameplay. You're missing the point that pub TF2 is and has always been a random and mindless gamemode in comparison to the pub versions of more popular e-sports, ruining any hope of consistency between competitive and public modes in this game from the very beginning. Pub League/Dota and CS:GO are miles ahead of pub TF2 in complexity, structure and competitive appeal. If you understand that, then you will understand why everyone who sees the competitive appeal in 6v6 or Highlander is against bringing in more elements of play from pub TF2. By doing so it would sacrifice the game's competitive structure and appeal for the more casual crowd who already prefer to play the game in its random and mindless format. It's a lose-lose situation if we sell out the game to pub players because what allowed the game to remain inherently competitive isn't there anymore. Highlander is the best in-between we have with a lot of room for skill and strategy that still has some pub resemblance and that's as far as we can go. Of course the only way around this issue is to make competitive TF2 the new pub TF2 instead of vice versa, but because TF2 makes money off things unrelated to our competitive scene that will never happen. [quote=Crayboff]What I mean is by the game isn't altered from regular gameplay is that competitive and casual play is similar and consistent. When new weapons are added, you have to try to adapt the scene to those new weapons if possible. I'm not saying every single weapon should be whitelisted, but the scene should allow for the game to move in that direction instead of vehemently trying to stick to "pure" gameplay.[/quote]



You're missing the point that pub TF2 is and has always been a random and mindless gamemode in comparison to the pub versions of more popular e-sports, ruining any hope of consistency between competitive and public modes in this game from the very beginning. Pub League/Dota and CS:GO are miles ahead of pub TF2 in complexity, structure and competitive appeal.



If you understand that, then you will understand why everyone who sees the competitive appeal in 6v6 or Highlander is against bringing in more elements of play from pub TF2. By doing so it would sacrifice the game's competitive structure and appeal for the more casual crowd who already prefer to play the game in its random and mindless format. It's a lose-lose situation if we sell out the game to pub players because what allowed the game to remain inherently competitive isn't there anymore.



Highlander is the best in-between we have with a lot of room for skill and strategy that still has some pub resemblance and that's as far as we can go. Of course the only way around this issue is to make competitive TF2 the new pub TF2 instead of vice versa, but because TF2 makes money off things unrelated to our competitive scene that will never happen.

25 #25 dMenace 6 Frags – + Hey WithADanceNumber, care to share your grandiose plan stirring in your head? Or you just wasting your time by complaining about people wasting their time? Hey WithADanceNumber, care to share your grandiose plan stirring in your head? Or you just wasting your time by complaining about people wasting their time?

26 #26 DanceNumber -1 Frags – + I'm saying theres no plan needed. Just play tf2. If it dies, it dies. People who wanna play tf2 will keep playing. I'm saying theres no plan needed. Just play tf2. If it dies, it dies. People who wanna play tf2 will keep playing.

27 #27 KevinIsPwn newbie.tf -7 Frags – + Implying that the reason we don't want to change the whitelist is because we're scared of change just shows that you've never tried playing with these unlocks in 6s before. We keep these weapons not because we're traditionalist elitists. Most of us just want to have fun and play a game that we can work towards being good at, and that's not possible to do with weapons like the whip, GRU, gunslinger, short circuit, etc. The nerd essays are getting pretty annoying. I know I wrote one a few months ago, but all the things you are saying could have been put in a moderately sized paragraph. edit: fixed parallelism Implying that the reason we don't want to change the whitelist is because we're scared of change just shows that you've never tried playing with these unlocks in 6s before. We keep these weapons not because we're traditionalist elitists. Most of us just want to have fun and play a game that we can work towards being good at, and that's not possible to do with weapons like the whip, GRU, gunslinger, short circuit, etc.



The nerd essays are getting pretty annoying. I know I wrote one a few months ago, but all the things you are saying could have been put in a moderately sized paragraph.



edit: fixed parallelism

28 #28 Crayboff 0 Frags – + bowswer5 Crayboff What I mean is by the game isn't altered from regular gameplay is that competitive and casual play is similar and consistent. When new weapons are added, you have to try to adapt the scene to those new weapons if possible. I'm not saying every single weapon should be whitelisted, but the scene should allow for the game to move in that direction instead of vehemently trying to stick to "pure" gameplay.

You're missing the point that pub TF2 is and has always been a random and mindless gamemode in comparison to the pub versions of more popular e-sports, ruining any hope of consistency between competitive and public modes in this game from the very beginning. Pub League/Dota and CS:GO are miles ahead of pub TF2 in complexity, structure and competitive appeal.



If you understand that, then you will understand why everyone who sees the competitive appeal in 6v6 or Highlander is against bringing in more elements of play from pub TF2. By doing so it would sacrifice the game's competitive structure and appeal for the more casual crowd who already prefer to play the game in its random and mindless format. It's a lose-lose situation if we sell out the game to pub players because what allowed the game to remain inherently competitive isn't there anymore.



Highlander is the best in-between we have with a lot of room for skill and strategy that still has some pub resemblance and that's as far as we can go. Of course the only way around this issue is to make competitive TF2 the new pub TF2 instead of vice versa, but because TF2 makes money off things unrelated to our competitive scene that will never happen. I agree with most of what you're saying. Pub tf2 is supposed to be a casual mostly unstructured experience and competitive is different from that. But the point I'm trying to get across is that if you approach the future of competitive in a it-has-to-be-this-one-way mentality, then you eliminate the possibility for improving the scene and growing it. I don't have a solution for what exactly needs to be done to grow the scene, but I know the worst thing would be to shut ourselves off from doing things like bringing more weapons into the whitelist or some other changes. [quote=bowswer5][quote=Crayboff]What I mean is by the game isn't altered from regular gameplay is that competitive and casual play is similar and consistent. When new weapons are added, you have to try to adapt the scene to those new weapons if possible. I'm not saying every single weapon should be whitelisted, but the scene should allow for the game to move in that direction instead of vehemently trying to stick to "pure" gameplay.[/quote]



You're missing the point that pub TF2 is and has always been a random and mindless gamemode in comparison to the pub versions of more popular e-sports, ruining any hope of consistency between competitive and public modes in this game from the very beginning. Pub League/Dota and CS:GO are miles ahead of pub TF2 in complexity, structure and competitive appeal.



If you understand that, then you will understand why everyone who sees the competitive appeal in 6v6 or Highlander is against bringing in more elements of play from pub TF2. By doing so it would sacrifice the game's competitive structure and appeal for the more casual crowd who already prefer to play the game in its random and mindless format. It's a lose-lose situation if we sell out the game to pub players because what allowed the game to remain inherently competitive isn't there anymore.



Highlander is the best in-between we have with a lot of room for skill and strategy that still has some pub resemblance and that's as far as we can go. Of course the only way around this issue is to make competitive TF2 the new pub TF2 instead of vice versa, but because TF2 makes money off things unrelated to our competitive scene that will never happen.[/quote]



I agree with most of what you're saying. Pub tf2 is supposed to be a casual mostly unstructured experience and competitive is different from that. But the point I'm trying to get across is that if you approach the future of competitive in a it-has-to-be-this-one-way mentality, then you eliminate the possibility for improving the scene and growing it.



I don't have a solution for what exactly needs to be done to grow the scene, but I know the worst thing would be to shut ourselves off from doing things like bringing more weapons into the whitelist or some other changes.

29 #29 Kond3P 2 Frags – + KevinIsPwn The nerd essays are getting pretty annoying. I know I wrote one a few months ago, but all the things you are saying could have been put in a moderately sized paragraph. It's not like you have to read these "nerd essays". What would it mean if people stopped making these? Communities need opinions and rants and counters to those. I think discussion is good even if some aren't the best writers in the world. [quote=KevinIsPwn]

The nerd essays are getting pretty annoying. I know I wrote one a few months ago, but all the things you are saying could have been put in a moderately sized paragraph.[/quote]



It's not like you have to read these "nerd essays". What would it mean if people stopped making these? Communities need opinions and rants and counters to those. I think discussion is good even if some aren't the best writers in the world.