Wandumyo i know im not a prem player myself but the last like 3-4 times d1/invite pugs were made they seemed to die off within the span of 1-2 months
like it honestly feels kinda like clockwork that we have general pugs ->d1/prem players complain about low skill level -> make their own seperate system -> prem pugs die after a month
am i just seeing things? i feel like you could go back to the tf2online threads, the pugchamp threads, the rahmix/prem rahmix threads and you could find all of these posts word for word
like i said im not a prem player myself but honestly the last few years make it seem like d1/prem player pugs are just destined to die and only really manage to fracture the playerbase
Activity is definitely the deciding factor. There is always a snowball effect going on where prem players increase the amount of other prem players (who want to play high level pugs) and "normal" players (who want to play against the prem players). When the regulars who usually get the pugs going stop playing it will lead to the discord/site slowly fading into obscurity. We just don't have enough players at the top to have them going 24/7