Unpopular Opinion:

Today on Talking CS: Valve/ESL announced a change in rules limiting the interaction between the coach and players during a live match. The rule has been widely criticized by players, personalities, and organizations for its seemingly retrogressive stance on the meta of having a coach in-game lead.

The rule in a nut-shell disallows all coach communication during a live match for the exception being, the coach only being able to communicate during warmup, half-time, or one of the four timeouts allowed. The coach may however still call a timeout and use that allotted time to adjust strategies.

I’m in the middle of this nasty debate and I understand why it can be viewed as harmful or viewed as justifiable. I’ll break down points and give people an iteration. Remember this is my opinion from a neutral standpoint, don’t agree with my opinion? That’s cool, you’re entitled to that.

1) Other sports have coaches — why not CS?

For starters lets stop with the comparisons, CS meta is CS and everything that changes will obviously happen because of CS and only that. We don’t draw rule-sets from the NFL just because they’re the NFL. Let’s stop comparing and realize there’s a set plan intended to work here and not in any other competitive environment.

Let’s look at the NFL: Coaches are allowed to speak during the pre-snap set, but they aren’t speaking in the ears of all the players, either one defensive linemen and one quarterback. In addition the NFL strictly implements rules to ensure fair play such as — the radios are one way, the coach may speak, the player can’t, there’s a 15 second time-limit, and again only one player can receive the plays.

The players are clearly marked (green dot on helmet) as well, so officials know who is talking when and where. It allows the officials such as referees and so forth to regulate the usage. In CS a coach can in-game lead through the entire game and it could make or break a game of CS. The meta is so distinctive that a great coach can absolutely turn the tables, essentially making a game a 6v5. It’s a competitive edge and a conundrum that’s been debated in the last few months.

If you were walking down the street and someone asked you if a game of 6v5 were fair? You would probably say fuck no and give him that look like they’re nuts for even asking! Now you’re probably saying “Well, hire better coaches” — that’s where you’re crossing a gray area. Coaches are amazing, I coach, and I want to do my very best to ensure I get my team on a path to success, and for us to be recognized more and more.. But with this rule I can absolutely understand why they (Valve/ESL) have chosen this route.

Coaches aren’t new, but they’re finding themselves more integral to the game through their actions such as strat-calling while out of the game. I was a huge advocate screaming for organizations to look into getting coaches. I was a huge advocate for granting coaches more authority outside the channel of just a mere support staff. However, when you integrate a coach into a dedicated role outside of a 5v5 competitive setting things can get debatably nasty.

PLAYERS UNION!

I’m sorry to break it to you, a players union might help slightly, but at the end of the day we’re almost a little too late for this — and honestly, we’ll be alright either way. Players are being treated better, organizations are going out of their own way to pay the players more, relocate them, cater to their every need, and of course facilitate their growth.

This isn’t 2010 where players are being underpaid. Where they played out of their own homes in an environment that didn’t prepare them. Where they didn’t have top tier players sitting them down and adjusting them to meet the mesh. Where they didn’t have support staff to train them physically or mentally. Where they had tournament organizers out-right refusing to play them their earnings. We’ve grown a long way and if we hadn’t, a union would have been great.

A union in this case would merely become a small hindrance at this point and time. Yes, universal rules would be great, but this is the real world, not a perfect world. We cannot expect everyone to get together and do one solid thing. That’s why organizations, businesses, and even eSports teams operate differently, to have that edge unlike no other. To attract a demographic who will view this or that because of their preferences.

Let me remind you of the underlining factor. A meta is an element of unknown, growing and adapting to surprise the shit out of you. Metas in games change to get the competitive juices flowing. They aren’t perfect, sometimes a change in meta could be horrible but for the most part, we’ve managed to adapt — just like we were intended to.

When the timer changed everyone thought the scene would self-implode. When the AWP movement/visuals changed everyone thought the AWPers would become obsolete. When the spray changed everyone praised it.. The second time around, it was unique, and different, and yes, people would have to adapt but if they want to remain professionals that is exactly what needs to happen. Otherwise, people and things become stale and complacent (look at Starcraft 2).

This change will require contending teams to adjust their infrastructure to depend on coaches in-game less and less which sets me up to the next point.

3) Coaches have traditionally been back-end staff

Coaches and support staff have always taken a back-end position. Their positions are there to develop players by creating infrastructures to facilitate growth individually and as a team. As much as I love how they transitioned but their role should merely be the advisor and mentor, not the 6th member of the team.

Understanding that Valve wants to grow CS:GO as an eSport which is ruled by the emphatic skill of the 5 players on the stage of each team. No coaches awkwardly sitting behind the team staring at a computer screaming out calls. No coaches feeding information that players don’t see. The competitive integrity would be questioned and again, teams would have unfair advantages.

Coaches truly need to work with strat-callers so they can call and play at the same time if this rule remains. At the end of the day this rule is one of many that will change as the scene grows. A union can only do so much as players and organizations will be at the mercy of the publisher and sanctioned events.

4) Lets boycott and stop attending events

Just because you don’t like a change, it doesn’t mean your collective voice will change it (some exceptions to this). Accept the fact and please be patient with this change. It’s a change that hasn’t been actively played out so wait and see the ramifications when that time comes.

Boycotting probably won’t happen, it’s not an ideal situation for anyone, a union will only hinder the scene as negotiations and other legalities explored will be leveraged and will push CS:GO into a corner. As much as we may dislike or like Valve there’s a lot of legalities on their side and if we ever want to see a TI-equivalency then we need to continue boosting numbers online and offline events.

Doing what’s wildly recommended will be suicide for the game. A double edged sword that ironically inflicts more bad than good to the players.

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Hi. I’m a consultancy owner. I deal with eSports, players, management and more. I occasionally write and bake awesome pies. This is an opinion piece that reflects on my ideology alone. Like my writing or want to get in contact with me? Twitter @MellowWalt or email w.sosa@esportsrda.net