HighImpactDolphinSteel is so much better than upward. If you poll it again (which you should) steel will poll better than upward, again. But even beyond that, it makes me sad that theatretechie's new map is now going to have to compete with steel, as it will probably never poll better than steel. This puts it in a terrible position to succeed, where theatretechie's last map (vigil) became one of the most beloved maps in the pool after many seasons of iteration. I fear nidal will be shelved forever after this season if the precedent of "1 A/D map only" is cemented right now.
The issue isn't that there should only be 1 A/D map forever or that none of these decisions should ever be made, its that RGL did it without even pretending to care about what players wanted. They didn't poll these decisions, they didn't even wait until the post season poll was closed to make them, and the head admin admitted to using old poll data and interpreting player answers to questions that were not asked on that poll. If the admins want to actually poll changes like this and the community supports them then great.