For those who don't know, a nine team invite means that each team plays each other twice. As in, its removes the random element of scheduling so the deciding factor for a team to go to lan is based on how well they did against the other teams instead of which teams they happened to face. The current Mad Men and AG "whose going to lan" is an example of this. Not saying that one is better than the other but the words "but AG has an easier schedule so they are going to lan" shouldn't come up.

Post in the ESEA thread, show your support and hopefully we can get it fixed for next season.

keep it at ten. #teamag4lyfe

KEEP THE FRAGS AT -10

With vector dead, would the bottom two teams move down to IM? With the poll and whoever wins IM it would require that. Or are they two teams that are going to die already

Not sure, if nobody else dies the options are

1) move down bottom 2 teams (after vector) and move up IM winner and poll winner

2) move down bottom team (after vector), move up IM winner and axe the poll

I would favor #2 because the poll is kind of a stupid popularity contest anyways

You could also put the bottom team and the IM winning team in the poll. Assuming no teams die.

Or you could include the second to last invite team in the poll.

I like that idea a lot. Drop last team, move up IM winner. Poll including second to last invite team and potential replacements.

But last season 3 IM teams moved up, Mad Men, r5, and root. What was up with that?

More teams were moved up because they expanded invite to 10 teams from 8.

There was a HUGE discussion at the beginning of this season about the invite poll. Invite teams should not be decided by a poll, there should show matches or a tournament to decide.

edit: that said, 9 team invite div is a great idea

couldn't the teams stay ay 10 and have 9 weeks?

won't happen ever

i like etf2l's system of matches between the hopefully-moving-ups of div 1 with the trying-not-to-drop-outs of low prem

Why did we go so long with polls for that? How are polls even a good idea? It's just a way of a team getting into invite because people want them there, not because they necessarily belong. Now I'm not saying any team voted into invite didn't belong in it, but it shouldn't be a situation where it's up to the people. Tournaments/Show matches are a great idea.

If there is a poll, in my opinion only invite players or playoff IM players should be able to vote on it, if not we as a community should set up a tournament to see for ourselves who should be moved up instead of blindly guessing

Pretty much every single LAN since about s7, we tried talking to Torbull about having a nine-team invite. He told us that he didn't wanna do that, and I believe it had mostly to do with having an odd number of teams just didn't feel right. There's really no reason not to do it. It's as fair as possible in our circumstance, and it doesn't allow teams to have an easier schedule compared to any other team.

Well, I guess you could have an unlucky draw against a team who is really good on a certain map, but that's on you, not the league.

Maybe I'm just being cynical but I'm pretty sure the invite poll exists to get people to buy premium. I don't think we can actually kill it especially with a solution that would require more work on ESEA's end to set up a bracket for the last invite spot. A communitty run tournament like Blueberry's suggestion is a really good idea, though.

Or against a team who have roster shake-ups or something and get much better/worse partway through the season, but that can't be avoided.
Although, on these lines, I do think that if a team dies, any wins they previously got should be turned into losses, because it's unfair if a team loses the LAN battle because their games against Team X was before they died where their competitors' were afterwards.

There's no killing the polls, there will not be 9 invite teams. ESEA doesn't really care about what we want in the end. I mean, they do sometimes, but when it comes down to big chances (like a 9 team invite division), they don't care.

I would say that the teams in lan contention are generally better than the teams that died, and should win their matches against that team pre-death.

9 team invite isn't a big change though. It's a smaller change than from 8 to 10 last season.

Perhaps we'll have better luck. With tf2's growth, its possible we have just a little more pull than we used to. If enough people show their support on the esea forums I think we should be able to accomplish it.

Maybe, maybe not. All we can do is try.

Were should call this the vector effect.

Being able to solidify more than 8 teams every season would be a pretty big change, but that's also on the players and not just ESEA.

One thing that we have to consider here though is that with a nine team invite, the prize pool for TF2 shrinks. Perhaps instead of asking for a nine team Invite, we have the Invite matches work the same way as they currently do in IM and Open where the first four weeks of the season per-determined. Then once the second half of the season begins, we have it make a schedule based on record.

I agree, if we don't get a 9 team invite, my next choice would be to have each team play all the other teams (round robin style) and then have the remaining matches be against teams close in record.

Still prefer 9 teams, though.

How much is "shrinking"? Are we just talking about the difference between having 7 paid players in Invite vs 6 in IM or is there something else I am missing? I mean even if the difference is a couple hundred dollars, we would still have much more than we did season 13.

Generally isn't always. Last season Xensity were in LAN contention and they lost to Don't Trip.

gonna bump this just the once, after that I'll assume everybody that is in support has posted