I’ve been professionally involved in esports since 2010 - not as long as some of the old timers like Sir Scoots (love you Scott), but long enough to have seen the industry change very rapidly, thanks in large part to a huge flood of sponsors entering the scene. I originally got involved with Starcraft 2, the successor to one of the first real esports, Starcraft: Brood War.

Just as I started working for the IGN Pro League (or IPL for short) in 2011 an esports prize pool arms race kicked off, with our organization and NASL offering $100,000 prizes for Starcraft 2 tournaments. At the time, pro players like Geoff “iNcontroL” Robinson began saying to me that this amount of money just can’t be ignored. That this was a true difference maker between tournament providers.

Flash forward to 2016 and we’re in the middle of a tournament with a $20 million prize pool. $20 million! Valve’s Dota 2 tournament The International, through their innovative crowd funding strategies, has set the yearly benchmark for the biggest esports event by sheer prize money. Last year’s almost $19 million prize pool set the record, and has easily been eclipsed by this year’s tournament.

But here’s the thing - this year no one seems to care. In the first couple years of The International, when players derived almost all of their income from prize money, this massive prize pool was a huge deal. Valve was providing a cool and fun way for fans to directly support the core competitive Dota crowd and it’s players benefitted as a result. More and more players could play Dota for a living.

However, in Dota, there is a lot of turnover on top tier teams. It’s actually become something of a running joke in the scene because the “post-International shuffle” is guaranteed to break up at least 3-4 top tier teams. But why is that? Why do Dota teams have higher turnover than other esports?

Let’s take a look at League of Legends, which “only” pays out a total of $2.13 million during its world finals. LoL is a considerably more popular game, typically in significantly more viewers. League of Legends has their League Championship Series (or LCS), a year long competition, split into two seasons, culminating in a worldwide finals at the end of the year. Last year, there were 14 million concurrent viewers during the finals. Furthermore, League of Legends is known for having limited turnover in its LCS teams.

So why are LoL teams less volatile? And why are so many pros willing to stick with the game instead of jumping onto Dota for a shot at a huge prize pool payday?

Salaries.

All players who make it onto an LCS roster are guaranteed salaries, support from the league and developer itself, and because of the inherent stability of the LCS, big money sponsors and celebrities are forming their own teams to compete in the league.

I don’t want to paint the LCS in an overly rosy light. Riot certainly has its problems that it has to address, including declining viewership this year, a very heavy-handed approach to disciplining LCS violations, and virtually no oversight from external organizations to arbitrate league concerns. However, it’s a fact that the more stable your scene, the less your prize pool matters. Your players are already well compensated, and your storylines are built on the players and games themselves, not how much money they’ve won.

Loading

Valve has recognized this, to a degree, and they’ve added a series of “majors” with multi-million dollar prize pools throughout the year to encourage teams to keep their rosters together and continue competing. And in fact, in the case of Team Liquid and OG, we’ve seen that stability in a team’s roster can lead to huge success as Liquid and OG have basically been 1st and 2nd at most recent major events because they haven’t shed their roster after every big event.

But I think it remains clear that the size of the prize pool, while instrumental initially in providing great PR and a huge event for the Dota scene, is now largely irrelevant. In years’ past there would be constant discussion about how big the Dota prize pool is going to be, and while this year is the biggest ever, it just doesn’t feel like it matters.

Esports are becoming more like traditional sports. The storylines and competition are driving more interest.

This opinion isn’t shared by many Dota fans themselves, and I have a theory about that. In contrast to most esports which experience huge peaks and valleys in viewership, the Dota community is fiercely loyal. Dota fans are Dota fans, and are ONLY Dota fans. So every event, you can consistently count on hundreds of thousands of engaged viewers to tune in.

In the past week I’ve spoken to some Dota players and analysts, and most have said they believe it’s important for this enormous prize pool to exist. I think that’s a reflection on the old professional Dota scene, where independent third parties run most events and there’s not much interference from Valve themselves, creating a financial system that’s largely reliant on large prize pools and large events.

I’m not convinced. I think this creates a scene that’s too unreliable for anyone but the very top teams to be able to keep stable rosters and pay their players. Lots of smaller organizations are reliant on the money that leagues pay out in order to stabilize their rosters and give their players a chance to do nothing but think about preparing and competing. Making them reliant on the prize money of just one big event isn’t a good thing. I’m glad Valve is adding majors, but I believe Dota 2 would be even healthier with salaries and a fully fleshed-out league.