erynnSide note: We are running reckoner because it is currently (to my knowledge) the only competitive map in active development and the creator is actually trying to get feedback to make a decent competitive map. It won't be perfect right away but if a few pugs are played on it and that results in some feedback getting back to them then it gives us the chance to get a new map that could be great. We aren't including it because we want to troll you guys. The original idea was to try and help out the map creator and see if something could happen with it.
for the most part i agree with what you're saying and its good to see evidence that there is more diversity in the map pool as a result, but the one thing I disagree with is the reasoning to include reckoner
in theory, it makes sense to have the most played pug site test out this new map and give it an actual player base to playtest it, but in practice the only results are people getting angry and talking with each other in mumble about how bad x y and z about the map are and how it should never be played in pugs
if after every reckoner pug the map creator was in a mumble channel and they talked about what they liked/disliked about it that would be a way to get actual feedback, or if players weren't too lazy to post on the thread with their thoughts, i think they would be much better results
a few points I've heard people make are that the map overall is way too big, the area between second and last is way too claustrophobic/cluttered with shit, one of the flank areas is impossible to push from mid into second from because it's super easy to spam from the shack on second point, the cap on the middle point is designed such that people capping are way too disadvantaged in a way that is unlike any other good cp map (think gullywash, metalworks, badlands mids--you have highground when capping, the only maps where you have a slight disadvantage capping are ultiduo maps and granary and process to an extent, but on reckoner it's such lowground that it's literally not worth going to during the midfight in any situation other than trying to go unseen and flank)
aieraincrease the captain game limit and since you are tracking ex invite players just give them captain powers along with their 2100 elo
to address aiera's point, there have been a bunch of situations where invite or other higher level players are trying to captain but don't get to which results in one team having a huge disadvantage because their captain is at a lower level than the majority of the players in the pug(ex: what mr bacon used to do in invite pugs)
one easy way to address this would be to make a hierarchy with the current invite players (people who actually played matches this season or in the past, not people roster riding like skeez) being prioritized over other players
however, this could result in problems if, for example, b4nny added captain to pugs with only open players and was guarenteed a captain slot, and pretty much instantly won the pug because he was the best player added
given that situation of one player better than all others is problematic even with the current system, but it could be exacerbated if there are only a few (maybe 2-3) very good players and the invite player who gets the captain automatically gets them self and therefore has an advantage, whereas if it were two players of the same skill level captaining nobody would have the advantage
aieraalso some maps just blow for pugs, that isn't to say they aren't good in rotation
i think there is actually some truth to this, for example pugs on badlands are generally a shit show because back caps are so much easier due to lack of coordination
in some situations teams are coordinated enough for badlands pugs to actually be pretty fun but i do agree with the point that in some scenarios certain maps just don't lend themselves to enjoyable pugs for anyone