Honestly i'm a bit fed up. What is the point of theorycrafting if the most popular posts in this thread are people jerking about and complaining about stuff they think will happen ?
I personally don't think that giving every scout a get-out-of-jail free card would make the game more fun or interesting, but I was wrong on other unlocks before (underestimating the mangler/overestimating the brass beast for example). There's only one way to find out and it is to actually try stuff out. Who knows, maybe the speed debuff that applies when the effect wears off will prove to be an interesting mechanic ? I'll admit that I didn't even knew that you couldn't block with the bonk.

I do think that unbanning it after a single invite-only tournament is a bit fast, since I really enjoy whitelist pre-season cups as they allow for every player, regardless of skill level, to give their input, but I understand the logistical constraints behind such a tourney. Lucrative's event had the merit of at least giving us a clearer view of what these unlocks are actually able to do.

Ultimately, I think we all play TF2 for different reasons. Some people might want to go back to the 2009 whitelist, where only the Kritzkrieg, Gunboats and Escape Plan were allowed, and maybe they would have more fun playing if that were the case. But I personally wouldn't. To me TF2 at its best is a game of endless possibilities instead of some sort of tactical RPS (subtle dig at Overwatch in a attempt to gain upfrags), and I think that most unlocks, even less-used ones are interesting as they offer at least another option. Some new options are simply not fun to play against (like the Vaccinator) and must be axed, but we can't really know without trying them first.

We've had this discussion before in the TFTV slack and if I recall correctly the only reason Québec has its own flag is because it was in the flag pack that enigma downloaded, not because it has an active independence movement or something.

Is there a list of the rosters and the matches somewhere ? Thanks for organizing this !

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z54MpfR3XE4

https://imgur.com/eZQvoaI
Yeah I wonder how he got caught

The puns in the writeups have to stop tbh.

OwO

lmg laid down some high-caliber answers

Can you describe your team ? Who's playing what .. ?
Our team consists of kinda weird peeps, there's Slayman, the pocket that makes roamers shy with his play, and he also likes to burp a lot, Man's a legend in my book, play really well with our medic since they both have history together in 9s.
Outsider - A reliable roamer, who knows most of the time what he's doing, he does some good bombs most of the time, some time, he's just dying. But that sometimes, and sometimes is kinda rare in his case. A really nice Ukrainian lad, it's nice to have a conversation with him, but i am just being a dick all the time and screaming at him for no reason. I just don't know. Don't even ask.
Noname - I don't know where to start with this guy, he is a pretty strange, most of the time i have no idea what he's thinking about, but his DM is on point most of the time, sniper plays, med picks. Proficient with both tracking and flicks, he is a solid backup to have.
Vorobey - Man, we found the diamond in a gutter, i don't want to boast about him, his pipes are insane at times, denying two soldiers and a scout, it's like a miracle that he agreed to play with us, and he is pretty chill, unlike me.
Danissimo - Medic main with a bit of a tunnel vision syndrome, can't see people who are pressing E by the side of him when he needs to flash them, but he is totally reliable, does some decent plays with his arrows on an almost consistent basis.
lmg - I would describe myself as an aggressive pocket scout and an aggressive teammate. I scream a lot, and that’s a bad thing, i tend to do aggressive plays all the time, and that's not really how a pocket scout should be playing, i wish to become better, but i believe my skill is enough for now.

Going into the season, were you expecting to make it to the final ? If not, how far did you expect to go ?
Going into the season, we were expecting to at least get into play-offs with how much we played scrims before the season even began, we kinda did expect to make it into finals or at least semi-finals after playing four weeks.

Going into the final, what do you think are your strong points ? In term of playstyle, maps…
Our strong point is that we played for a month and a half of scrims before the season, we know what we can do, and what we will be doing. Communication and shot calling are also decent if everyone is listening and if there is no useless chit-chat going on, but what did you expect, this is open.

And what do you think about the opposing team ?
What do i think ? Personally, i think that their team is pretty strong, not gonna lie, in terms of friendliness, Mr jeves and josh were pretty toxic, but everyone else was pretty chill when we played week 4 with them. That was a pretty friendly game, except for pregame where Mr jeves was taunting us a lot. And i believe the team thinks the same as me, jeves and josh are pretty toxic, the rest are a bunch of swell guys.

Any closing words or shout-outs ?
Shoutout to Pie, Pink and Niesta, the guys that subbed for us on numerous occasions, either it would be passing out due to sickness, monitors breaking because of age, or just sickness by itself. We wouldn't be able to scrim properly without them.

Canlock from 100 YEARS was able to give us some insight.

Can you describe your team ? Who's playing what .. ?
Well I could describe my team as bunch of different types of players with different mind sets to be honest. Me, canlock playing pocket scout, Matzer flank scout, jeves roamer, grey pocket soldier, mamzz demo, cak3 medic.

Going into the season, were you expecting to make it to the final ? If not, how far did you expect to go ?
I wasn't actually in this team for first 3 weeks or so but they were really keen to win so yes i expected to make it to the finals.

Going into the final, what do you think are your strong points ? In term of playstyle, maps...
Our strong point is that we are keen and we give so much time to improve and fix our problems in general to win. And i think our DM is above the most of the teams of this division.

And what do you think about the opposing team ?
Well about the Russians, they are pretty good DM-wise so we will see in the finals :^)

Any closing words or shout-outs ?
Shoutout to my ef2l kanker and samii <3

Jorge also offered his insight

Can you describe your team ? Who's playing what .. ?
Jake and Sheep scouts, Nicco and BreD soldiers, Tiia demo and me (Jorge) on medic.

Going into the season, were you expecting to make it to the final ? If not, how far did you expect to go ?
I don't think we were expecting to make it to the finals as plenty of other teams had several high players or entire rosters composed of higher division players. However, as the season progressed, we were convincingly beating every mid team and we had close scrims against Div 1 and 2 teams, making us believe we could make it to the finals. I think its been a very interesting season with a lot of strong teams, any of which could've made it to the finals.

Going into the final, what do you think are your strong points ? In term of playstyle, maps…
Most of the team has known each other for several years and they have a strong bond which shows during games. We listen to each other and coordinate most of the plays, so a slowly paced and methodical game style suits us best. Most of the teams we've played against rely on DM so it's been interesting and fun forcing them to slow things down, waiting for cracks or impatience to show. I wouldn't point out strong or weak maps for our team but I think we thrive on open 5cp maps, reason as to which process and snake are two of the maps we'll be playing.

And what do you think about the opposing team ?
Having been part of Flowllout for almost two years gives me a deep insight into their gamestyle and usual plays so the mind games will definitely be interesting. They are a very solid team with previous Mid Grand Finals experience, as well as several divisions in high and Div 2. It will be a close and intense game, would definitely recommend to watch!

Any closing words or shout-outs ?
Shoutout to Silver for subbing for most of the season and playoffs.

Hellblazer of Flowllout shared his thoughts on tonight's game

Can you describe your team ? Who's playing what .. ?
The way I see it, my team and I have been playing the game for as long as we can remember, the majority of our players have already had high experience in past seasons and this isn't the first time we're in the GF, at least not for me, sprite and mars. I do give a lot of credit to sprite for getting us this far, since he did get second place in division 1 last season, but there is no denying that the rest of my teammates are as keen if not keener than any other team I've been apart of, we're a team full of talent and dedicated players
Well the roster hasn't really had a major change, apart from the players from last season either retiring or being replaced due to complications, the reason has in fact not changed that much. We've replaced our previous soldier roamer with lokko and took under our wings lurkki (the med) and sprite (our demo)
I'm playing as the pocket soldier and horizonn/mars are both our scout players

Going into the season, were you expecting to make it to the final ? If not, how far did you expect to go ?
Well to be honest, I can't talk for the rest of the guys on my team but I was pretty confident with reaching the grand finals since the season started, since the majority of the players on the flowllout roster have already had previous experience in high and were supposed to be placed in Divison 2 this season, considering the performance we had last season. This doesn't mean that this season has been easy on the contrary the players we've went up against have all been a challenge and have all displayed different strategies which we fortunately, at least for the most part, managed to beat. So to conclude that question, yes most of us did expect to make it this far

Going into the final, what do you think are your strong points ? In term of playstyle, maps…
Throughout the season we've had plenty of scrims which would shape up the way we played with one another. That being said, I think one point that I can say that sticks out is how we're all friends and at the end of the day enjoy each others' company regardless of how a game would be going underway.
We really don't care which maps we're playing since we scrim almost if not every day of the week and practice the maps for the week so overall I don't think we have any maps that we would prefer over others.

And what do you think about the opposing team ?
The opposite team ( nighttime sixes ) will be quite the challenge, there is no denying that, however we do believe that during our time together we managed to expand our game style and have ways to counter theirs, despite the previous results we had against them in scrims. They are a team which without any doubt was considered to be the favorite since they do consist of previous mid/high players on it which did play in similar circumstances as now.

Any closing words or shout-outs ?
I hope the game does not go one sided and that despite the skill level to still have an exciting match which will hopefully entertain the viewers watching. I'd like to give a big shoutout to my team , skills, am, sam/mattu , plunk and of course toota who have all been supportive of us despite the rough start we had in the season.

They are separate divisions, like Open and Intermediate.

MATTYAZN had this to say in prevision of this game

Can you describe your team ? Who's playing what .. ?
CLARTED can only be described as a delicate balance of class, talent and technical supremacy. Our journey began in pre-season, where the discovery of Catbowcar as a top level medic triggered the formation of a new European powerhouse. Catbowcar was quite physical and big but had delicate hands for his size so that is something we really wanted to replicate as a team. However, it became apparent early on that his lack of brain cells was severely detrimental to both himself and the clarted franchise. The only solution was for him to be swiftly kicked, and Kars was brought in as an emergency replacement. An absolute physical specimen, Kars’ excellent ball carrying ability and devastating good looks have really enabled our team to flourish.
The current roster going into the final consists of Adonis Kars on Medic, Matty on Demo, oJ and Charlie on soldiers, Gaz scout, and top Prem Highlander S17 Scout for inVision with the most kills on the class and 2nd most overall in the league, Vouri.

Going into the season, were you expecting to make it to the final ? If not, how far did you expect to go ?
Early on we at least expect to make playoffs. However, as the season progressed it became increasingly apparent that our chances were bleak. The removal of Catbowcar allowed new cracks to emerge in the form of the radical under-performance of the soldiers, who were lacking in both the aim and brain departments. Charlie particularly seemed to have undergone a mid season transformation from an absolute weapon to an absolute wet wipe, clogging comms and generally doing fuck all. oJ on the other hand was too busy either lagging out or succumbing to a knob obsession. Matty realized that something had to change, or the route to playoffs would be blocked permanently and Vouri would be unable to impress his Thai girlfriend at the Marriott Hotel in Bangkok who is extremely attractive both physically and emotionally. With the threat of losing such a decent bit of kit, Matty made the executive decision to relinquish Charlie of all main calling roles, which were transferred to Kars immediately. The effect was drastic; performances improved, Gaz got a pay rise, Vouri got laid, and Charlie finally stopped being such a soggy little bitch.

Going into the final, what do you think are your strong points ? In term of playstyle, maps...
Our playstyle mainly centers around Matty mcrolling them. Our best maps are definitely badlands and granny.

And what do you think about the opposing team ?
We lost early on in the season to them. Lupus gave us the pikey python on soldier, what can you do really. Now we’re back and he isn’t so we’re feeling confident going into this game.

Any closing words or shout-outs ?
Shout-out to both team galactic and pokerstars.uk for their generous sponsorship and LAN PC’s.

Here is junnu, representing yakuza

Can you describe your team ? Who's playing what .. ?
At the moment, our team consists of ins, me, ever_x, gona, and drezzo on scout, roamer, pocket, demo, and medic respectively. We've been really shaky all season with multiple role and player switches so I’m pretty happy about making it so far. Also I only listed 5 players from our team because 1 of us has been away for like 3 weeks now so we most likely aren't gonna play with him.

Going into the season, were you expecting to make it to the final ? If not, how far did you expect to go ?
In the beginning, we were expecting to do well and aimed to win. We had a couple of shaky time periods but we haven't changed our goal at all and are still aiming to win.

Going into the final, what do you think are your strong points ? In term of playstyle, maps...
Going into the final, I think we possibly aren't ready in terms of practice since we've lacked a roster that’s available to play consistently, but I think our strong point is our players having lots of experience which could possibly turn the tides in our favor. We've played the opposing team before during the season and won but both of us have different rosters since, and we haven't played each other since that game.

And what do you think about the opposing team ?
I think they're good but I don’t know how they play since we've only played them once and they have a slightly different roster from since, and so do we.

Any closing words or shout-outs ?
Shout-outs to mercyless (and my team) for picking me up on roamer, playing roamer has been a blast.
pun intended

Moving on, we have oddbar, Vague team leader offering some hopefully not too vague answers

Can you describe your team ? Who's playing what .. ?
mason and phong - scouts, pb med, odd demo, shaggz and lena are sollys
Going into the season, were you expecting to make it to the final ? If not, how far did you expect to go ?
We hoped to go to playoffs, no more.
Going into the final, what do you think are your strong points ? In term of playstyle, maps...
Regarding playstyle and strong points, they are kind of a secret strategy you know :) I can always answer this after the final if you don’t mind.
And what do you think of the opposing team ?
I think it's wrong when mid players play low, but we’ll take them on and are ready for any difficulties. I think soldiers are their strong point, and their scout - "prm" has an insane skill level I think.
Any closing words/shout-outs ?
In general, as part of the Russian community, I want to say that it is very unpleasant for me to see how every season my comrades try to break the rules. If you remember season 30, then most account sharing and ban evasions were from the Russian community, so I want to say that it's time to start playing fairly and working on your skill, the Vague team only stands for fair play. I think it's better to fairly lose than to win unfairly.My personal shoutout for pb for organizing the team in this season.