So when you say

Are you saying there are no class limits? Or that team leaders will choose the classes to be played for their team ahead of the game? Or that you can only do unusual styles of class compositions?

You should also clarify if you're having any weapons banned, or using another leagues ban list, etc...

Good luck with the tournament and I added you on steam, to give you some extra keys I have that you can add/cover the tournament's prizes.

I can understand how you can read it that way, but that's not at all the intention of the statement. I think the newbie mixes idea is fantastic and it's something we even are in talks about doing something similar because it's such a good idea.

I think having comp community driven newbie teams is fantastic and important because not every person is lucky enough to have 5 friends who also play tf2 and also want to get into comp. I was just simply pointing out these were not teams that originated from that type of system, but teams who were interested enough to create their own teams without any guidance or comp community support. Which is unusual, IMO, to get so many teams like that.

If we had say 5-10 community driven newbies teams and 5-10 new on their own. That wouldn't be as unusual, though still good/impressive

This is correct.

I believe we have a handful of EU people in the league. We had about 2-3 South American teams, that we, unfortunately, had to turn away.

We'd definitely consider expanding to the EU with this format if this league goes well.

Alright, after having a conversation with Daffodil, his team leader. I've decided to remove the ban on pete.

Shit, they're on to me.

Because the reason for your ban is directly tied to the fact that you enabled other people to be able to cheat in the game. Though with an understandable reason. If Valve patches the exploit, then your ban wouldn't have a reason. Since your ban is for sharing an exploit, against the wishes of the league. Obviously, you did not this malice, so if was fixed, then we'd remove the ban.

Again, the thing to emphasize here, because most are ignoring it. Is that I am not against the choice of action, because as many of you stated and I agree (and agreed in the original DM I sent to pete.) Sometimes releasing an exploit publically is the best way to get it patch.

However, we've RECENTLY given Valve multiple ways to do this exploit, including different ways than pete provided. We asked Pete to take this post down, because we want to give a chance to Valve to be able patch it first.

And again, many are ignoring, if Valve didn't patch it. Then I'd be fine with going down this route, as clearly going down the route of discretely giving them information did not work.

This can be summed as

- RGL sends multiple spy hearing exploits to Valve
- Pete post a detailed guide on how to do one method of this cheat
- RGL request that he takes this down, as RGL has recently sent Valve this info and want to give them a chance to fix it first
- Pete refuses
- RGL bans Pete for sharing instructions in how to cheat in tf2, against the wishes of RGL

Because the ban was not for the assumption that you use it in a match. Most people who cheat, try to do so secretly, not expose it. The ban was for the other people who you inspired to use the cheat by posting explicit details on how to use the cheat.

I removed it because it really didn't play into and didn't affect the length of the ban.

We've banned several people who've been caught using this.

So there's a difference between raising awareness, even giving broad strokes of detail and actually explaining in detail how to do the exploit.

There's a difference between making a post letting people know about the prevalence of a new or existing cheat software and what it can accomplish. Versus making a post laying out in step by step detail of how to install, how to use it, etc....

I know that when I was trying to find out the information on how to do it, so I can send it on to Valve. I spent a moderate amount of time and still was not able to figure it out. And I'm sure others would be in the same boat if he raised awareness, they that they wouldn't be able to cheat despite it becoming more known about.

Obviously, it exists out there, at least one (or more people) have figured it out and has past it around.

I don't disagree with Pete's goals and I don't fault his frustration with the problem. I do disagree what releasing explicit details when Valve has not put out an update recently to potentially fix this. As I even stated in my DM to him that he posted on twitter. "If it's not in the next update, then I would be behind you doing this." Since not too long ago we sent over the info to Valve, with multiple variations on how you can use the same idea to cheat.

Which is to say, I would not be against his actions, if we actually saw that Valve did not update it in the next update.

And this is a ban we will almost certainly be re-evaluated as updates come out and more information.

You're allowed to disagree with us placing a ban on someone who is helping others cheat, even if the cheat has existed prior to this. And I understand why others would feel that way. It's not wrong, this is definitely something we were on the fence about, but ultimately we cannot support people who actively pubically show others how to cheat, even if the reason behind it is good. Because the new people who will actually be using it, will not be using it for good reasons.

I don't disagree, I'm very much on the edge about the original viaduct. The thing that I think is good about stock viaduct is that connector is filled in actually helps allow flex classes to see more play and be more viable. Whereas in Product, the soldier completely dominates that area.

I was planning on reaching out to a map maker to see if we could take Product, but make connector closer to the original. So then the version we could use is basically koth_viaduct, except for being symmetrical and other fixes that the map makers have put in over the years.

We also have 75+ teams playing in divisions without any cash prize. To put in perspective, ESEA and UGC (NA) have only about ~60 teams total in each.

And the most interesting part is that we have a "newbie" div that is 18 teams large, that is purely teams of six players with basically no comp experience. This is separate from our "Open" divs, which has around 22 teams.

It's been a long time since I've seen so many completely fresh teams in a league.

I just read through the past stuff, how about this. I'll put my own money on the line.

Because there were a lot of discussions back with whitelist and how weapons are so broken, and large whitelists are needed for sixes currently. I think there was even some challenges tossed out on twitter, how teams could beat froyotech with these 'broken' unlocks.

I'll add this to the prize pool, a froyotech bounty. If any team (not froyotech) finishes in 1st place in this league. I will cover the winning teams ESEA-Invite league entry fees for next season (6 mains + 2 subs). This is on top of the $800 top prize.

None of the cash prizes for RGL-Invite are tied to playing "gimmicky." You can play 2-2-1-1 all you want, if it's truly the best line-up. The cash prizes in invite are paid for your performance, not line-ups.

Update, thanks to the many donations to the prize pool over the last couple weeks and our sponsorship with MarketPlace.tf. We've decided to extend out the prize pool.

The prize pool has now grown to $2,120 (up to $2,360)

The payouts are the same, except for 4th-8th (now larger.) 1st $800 | 2nd $600 | 3rd $300 | 4th $180 | 5th-8th $120

We currently have 6 teams signed up.

Top 4 teams go into playoffs, if you finish in 5th,6th,7th,8th, you will get a payout for playing. Provided you did not forfeit or throw any games and did not receive any RGL penalties.

Currently, the league has 80 teams that are already playing, and still have 15+ teams who only need 1-2 players to complete their rosters. So if you're interested and have been sitting on the fence, you can still find a team, but it needs to be by tonight.

New Team Registration Closes Tonight!!

We appreciate the support so far and are looking forward to learning what we can from this league.

For more info on everything, check out this great post b4nny made yesterday on reddit.

You can join our discord and post in the #na-mm-looking-for-scrims

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Should be the final update prior to the start of the pilot league. We are extending registration by about one week. Registration will now end on Friday, March 8th.

We've had over 115 teams created in the last 2.5 weeks! While this is an amazing level of interest. It also creates more work for us behind the scenes. We've brought on more admins and are currently getting caught up on vetting all of the teams.

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We've also hit our first stretch goal in Invite of six teams. So Invite's Prizepool is now $1,800 (paying out to top 4.)

If we get two more teams to Invite, the prize pool will grow to $2,500 (paying out top 5.)

Separate from this, ALL TEAMS are eligible for the bounty system being sponsored by b4nny. Every team has a chance to win up to 18 keys. You can read more about that here.

We are also working on a in-game badge that players will recieve.

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You can register at @ http://MM.RGL.gg

If you are looking for players or looking for a team to join you can join our discord and post in the (LFT) #na-mm-looking-for-team and (LFP) #na-mm-teams-looking-for-players channels.

Howdy everyone,

Some amazing news happened last night. We had a donation to the prize pool of $1,000!! With that great news, we're expanding out our stretch goals.

In the first week we've had 4 Invite teams sign-up, 56 teams overall. We added stretch goals to help inspire our top division to have as many different team perspectives as possible. Here are the updated stretch goals:

Current Prizepool: $2120 (up to $2360)

1st $800 | 2nd $600 | 3rd $300 | 4th $180 | 5th-8th $120

Max Number of Invite Teams: 8

Again the league is 5 weeks + 2 matches in playoffs, 1 match per week, starting on March 5th. Registration closes on March 2nd.

- Register your team today @ http://MM.RGL.gg
- Original article with more details about the pilot league.

Howdy Everyone!

RGL is very excited to share that http://marketplace.tf is sponsoring our sixes league!

With that, RGL is announcing stretch goals for our Invite division to increase the prize pool. The current prize pool is $600.

Stretch Goal #1: If Invite has 6 ESEA-I/RGL-I caliber teams, the prize pool will double to $1,200.
Stretch Goal #2: If Invite has 8 ESEA-I/RGL-I caliber teams, the prize pool will expand to $1,500.

Read more about it in our latest article.

We've already had 37 48 teams sign-up in the first 7 days! Hope all of you can join us.

15 days left to register!

- Register @ http://MM.RGL.gg
- Original article with more details about the pilot league.

No one's evaded any question, the answer to this question has been given in the front page news article as well as in our reddit post and probably in this thread as well.

Again, I'll state this. This league is not to prove that MM is the greatest thing in the world and we've all been missing out. The goal isn't to prove that no class restrictions will help class diversity, I agree with you. I'm guessing it'll get worst.

The goal is very clearly stated directly in the article on the front page is to gain information from this league that we can give to Valve as well as the Comp Community and hopefully both can try to get closer to a unification point. As we'll have evidence from every level of comp tf2 skill sets to show why this format does or does not work. Or what aspect of it works or does not work.

Payload has been very effective in Prolander and seems to work well in MM. Can this tournament help show us if it works when you have two proper teams? Or most teams strongly dislike it?

Sixes still has a large whitelist compared to other leagues, can this league help show that at least /some/ of those weapons could be unbanned? Or will this clearly back the players who are holding the line in the global whitelist talks?

Does having no class restrictions allow class diversity to happen? Or does it make class diversity worst due to the balance of the classes?

etc...

Many people have theory crafted about these ideas, but we've never really truly investigated this. Sure there's been those half-hearted events where two teams play a couple maps with nothing on the line, but that never really seemed to prove much. Now with this cup, we will have multiple weeks of data, from every skill level and detailed survey feedback from all of these levels.

Valve has shown themselves to work with the comp community through adding a comp matchmaking into the game. Changing the system to have placement matches and most importantly balancing weapons seemingly with the focus of Comp in mind. They've made strides to help out the comp community, but we as a community haven't done anything but dismiss them.

Again, this isn't to say what they're doing is right, but regardless of whether or not this format is successful. We will come away from this situation with something positive.

I think you summed it up perfectly.

I don't expect us to continue the league, unless the format is well liked. And if it is, then we might consider retiring Prolander in place of this. This pilot league/event, first and foremost is to promote experimentation with money on the line and get feedback for the community and Valve. If we actually learn the format is actually good, then that's a bonus and we might pursue it more, depending on what other leagues do.