Dave "dave" Hopton considers the effect of the new ESL Season V rules, and the implications it could have.

It was just over a month ago that, in my opening article for TF2's return to Cadred, I commented that the scene was, after some highs and lows, still “running a bit short on leagues”.

It's great to be able to say then, just a few short weeks later, that the prospect for online TF2 looks pretty promising in the near future.

The godfather of the European scene, ETF2L, has started it's 7th online Major League with 350 teams in fierce competition, whilst the ever-dedicated community over at Wireplay are half way through their 5th Season with just under 150 teams battling it out. The new kid on the block, Esports Heaven, is continuing to put on fantastic cups which have been met with a great response from the TF2 community and have been hugely successful, and on the distant horizon there may even be a return for the ShopTo.Net tournaments, which would add another prize competition for teams to get stuck in to. I would mention Eurokrieg, but that appears to have about as much chance of ever being launched as my neighbour Alan does of stopping mowing his lawn every Saturday morning, at 8 am sharp – whatever the weather, however little his grass has grown.

With that small rant out of the way, it's the announcement ESL made on Monday that I would like to focus on. After a pretty long break from running a 6v6 League competition, it's welcome news to hear that Europe's “oldest and largest online league” have opened sign ups for their 5th Major Season, which should prove a great addition to the competitive scene. Upon reading their news post though, I was surprised to see that the Admin team have decided to make some fairly bold decisions surrounding the ever-controversial weapon unlocks, selections for the map pool and the use of Aequitas, the love-hate Anti-Cheat software.

A potentially dangerous divide? The new ESL bans

I don't want to get into a big debate about weapons – my colleague JimmyBreeze already wrote a great article that pretty much summarises my thoughts perfectly – or on the merits and problems of Anti-Cheat software, but I do want to explore why ESL have decided upon these changes and what effect this could have. For those of you who are unaware of what they've announced, allow to me explain.

Following a poll of the Top 10 European teams, they have placed a blanket ban on all new Soldier and Demoman unlocks released in the recent War Update, as well as bans on the Sandman and Force of Nature for the Scout. Penalising players who fail to use Aequitas will now be much stricter, and the brand new map Gorge that was designed specifically for competitive play by Valve, along with the fairly unpopular map Fastlane, have been excluded from the map pool,. I spoke briefly to the Head ESL TF2 Admin Anakin to find out exactly why this was.

Over the last few seasons, there have been a lack of top teams competing within ESL, so with this season we decided to create a Premier Division and get every top team involved. This has been possible for everyone except Dignitas. We made a few questions concerning unlockable weapons and the map pool, which we sent to the top 10 TF2 teams, and based on their feedback, we've decided to ban the weapons they didn't want, and also to not include Fastlane and Gorge in the map pool.

A mixed reception - Gorge: rejected by ESL but accepted by ETF2L

There are undoubtedly some really great consequences that are emerging from these decisions. Giving the top teams a direct means to influence how the league should be run will undeniably motivate them to keep playing, and will no doubt attract many other teams to compete within the League, that will further provide some competition to the monopoly that is ETF2L. For the scene as a whole, the involvement of ESL should result in some great exposure throughout European competitive gaming, and hopefully a good selection of prizes to entice more players to pick up the game, especially in the EMS Series.

As you may have guessed from my tone earlier though, I do have some personal concerns about the potential divide this could cause within the European scene. Whilst not perfect, ETF2L has aimed with it's many polls to please the masses on issues like weapon unlocks, which on balance have at least been reasonably successful . The top-down approach ESL has taken for Season V however, could possibly alienate many lower end players who see no reason for such drastic banning of parts of the game, and it also does little to help maintain the arm Valve have extended to top-level TF2 players to create and develop the competitive side of TF2 – something we should be incredibly proud of, and a relationship we should see as an absolute priority to keep in good health.

The whole point of many of these analytical articles on Cadred is to educate the reader on the latest events in the scene, and make them think about what is happening to their game and the state of eSports in general. We continually write about many of the problems facing gaming communities as if they are new ones, mainly because the games being discussed have often just been released or are reacting to new content, but we have a wealth of history to look at, right here on Cadred, that can provide us with the answers to our questions,and problems and show us what happens when rule-sets begin to split and the consequences it can have on the game in question.

History repeats itself, so can we avoid these mistakes?

Although many people might be tired of hearing about it, a clear example we can learn from is the CGS, and the big problems it caused when the organisers decided to change some of the fundamental rules of the CS:S tournament – maximum rounds, starting money and round times – simply to benefit TV coverage. The move has been widely cited as one of the key reasons for the eventual failure of the competition, pushing a type of game-play that didn't necessarily work for players, for the sake of making it easier for uneducated viewers watching on TV to understand what was happening. It illustrated how important getting the right balance of rules is within a game, something we can certainly apply to TF2.

We can also look at the introduction of the ProMod to competitive COD4 as another example of the damage it can have on a game. Whilst I don't profess to be in any way an expert on COD4, it's a well acknowledged truth across all games that ProMods create a barrier that stops pub players from trying the competitive game-mode, and consequently slow the growth of a competitive scene. It's great to see that COD4 is making a return, but arguably it may not have suffered such a dip if it had enjoyed a steady stream of new players picking up the competitive side of the game – made easier if they didn't have to learn and engage with a ProMod. All throughout it's existence, pro TF2 has suffered from accusations of it being a completely different game to the one played on public servers, with banned weapons and class limits, so it's imperative that we don't do any more to enlarge the gap between pub and pro.

The progression of eSports will only come when we learn from our past and avoid repeating similar mistakes in multiple games. It's vital therefore that we as a TF2 community make sure we use every available source to make the best decision possible for our future. I can only stress here that I'm not trying to say ESL's decision is an absolutely bad thing, but more that I hope it does not split our community – something we desperately don't want or need. The only foolproof way we can make sure this doesn't happen is for as many teams as possible to sign up for Season V (which closes tonight!), make the most of the biggest online League in Europe offering us a place to play, and stay united as a scene - whatever the rule-set.