Before you comment anything Im not here to shit on ESEA and straight up say its bad, im asking this as a literal question, because of my exp in ESEA in the past few weeks. Allow me to summarize...
1. My teams first week we had to reschedule twice because the enemy team couldn't get their client to work, and when we finally ffw them on the second (third?) day we were set to play, they complained about it and said we "jew'd" them out of a win.
2. My team was placed against a team that was clearly way, way above our skill level, and we lost a 5v6 (We had 6). 3. After changing teams (And was kicked and treated like shit even though I agreed to stay until a replacement was found) I ended up on a new team with people who some were fairly new to comp TF2, which is fine, everyone has their starts, but we were facing a mid-open team where they ran 3 offclasses the entire game, and we still lost.
4, I joined another team, where we literally ffw 3 times in a row because mains did not show up without a reason, and we died.
5. I had a friend who need me to play tonight, but even though im a paid up player and open is apparently an entire open leauge with no restrictions on who can play in it (Thats another reason I dont like ESEA atm either) I cannot ring for my friends team because I forgot to roster, and can't roster during a match.
So, to sum it up, heres how I see it.
1. ESEA forces you to use a crappy client that doesent work 1/4th of the time.
2. They do not allow ringers, even though most open teams clearly need it
3. The players are toxic as hell, both the ones your playing with and the ones your playing against.
Now I bet your about to post "Fuckin, UGC has the same problems you nerd". Well yeah, I would agree, if I had those problems before
1. Ive played about 6 or 7 seasons of HL and 3 seasons of 6's, and I have only had to forfeit 3 or 4 times. I have forfeited about 6 times in the past month as opposed to 2/2.5 years of playing in UGC
2. I have never once had to cancel a scrim or match due to a client error, or had to cancel/resched because of a lack of a server.
3. I have only once ever had a team deny ringers entirely to my team.
4. I never faced platinum/gold players against me on my steel team (IE: Mid/High Open) and it was allowed.
I also post this because I have people trying to counter my points by using these arguements
1. "Its just/Its because/thats just how ESEA is" Thats not a valid arguement, that doesent disprove my points really
2."You don't have to worry about sandbaggers/you don't need to buy a server" First off, all you have to do is match/check rosters, its not hard and takes like 5-10 minutes, I would rather do that than pay the money for premium. Second, servers have never been an issue, I used a free one 90% of my TF2 games, and never once did I cancel one for a scrim or match, because I could always find one.
3."You improve faster" I guess? I have never found improvement being rolled by someone whos 4 or 5 times better than my team. Someone whos slightly better or a division up? Yes. Being absolutely rolled? No.
To sum it up, im overall paying for a worse experience in a paid leauge instead of my better experience in my free one.
Again, im not trying to shit on ESEA, im asking if anyone can explain the benefits to me despite these points. So far, i'm not convinced its worth paying for
To add, I don't intend to blame or say that this is the TF2 ESEA admins fault, they have alot on their shoulders and I do appreciate all the work they put in.
Thank you for your time, I really wanna try to see the light at the end of this tunnel because it seems like there is no point playing in ESEA unless your like, a mid-silver 6's player at the very least.