wtf are you talking about, seriously.
fix is still one of the absolute best and he could rape the hell out of div2 if he felt like grabbing every quad, every weapon, every armor.
But he's not, he's playing with friends and letting them evolve.

And about this whole "excluding div3 players and destroying the scene" argument, first of all understand the argument and purpose for why we would exclude you, secondly realize that EQL will still be there, you will have your competitive gaming just like you've always had.
div3 and div2 isn't dying, div1 is, we don't need to revive div3, we need to revive div1 and that's what we're talking about, nothing else.

yeah fix in div2 is a joke also, just like the other 20 div1 players slumming it there. And didn't fix even play in div3 for a while? lol.
But ok, they can be a good influence on the worse players there, giving them some experience and inspiration, but those former div1 players would rather play in a true div1 with ~10 teams and lots of exciting and challenging games.
But sure, it's not hard to drop down a division and play casual like 70% of your best - cause it will still win you games.

The reason they stepped down to div2 in the first place, is because div1 got too hard for them - the best of the best gathered in top 3 clans and they were left stuck in the middle with no light at the end of the tunnel.

It's always been like that really, the top clans are much better than middle clans - but it's not so obvious when it's the top 10 teams, that has a gap to the next 30 teams, but when it's top 2 and big gap down to next top 5, it becomes so much more obvious. And the competition among the teams in each skill group becomes lame also because there are so few equal skilled teams.

World first: I completely agree with rkd.

Try to understand that this is ANOTHER GOOD THING FOR QW. There's absolutely no negative aspect to it.

Remember Villains? That league was the shit. And it was more elitist than anything we could ever dream up.

It's really simple. More QuakeWorld is good. Hot games are good. Competition is good. Don't be fooled into thinking that "elitist jerks are stealing this idea" just because all the discussions are taking place in this thread.

The argument: "Denying div3 chances of improving" is false. They have every oppurtunity in the world to improve. This said system will, if anything, give them an incentive to do so, depending ofcourse on how this all pans out.

"div3 and div2 isn't dying, div1 is, we don't need to revive div3, we need to revive div1 and that's what we're talking about, nothing else"

No, div3 is dying. And your not just talking about div1. Read your own sentance again.

And again, i think most here is hoping you get that tournament going. It will be good for all of us as a community. And i really hope there will be more div1 teams after this project.

And for me personally i hope someone with the time and skill can create something like what pg suggested for the whole community also. (not twisting any charityworkers arms or forcing anyone to participate)

Just stop talking shit and drop those attitudes.

Best of luck.

Yes, I do. As a matter of fact, I adminned in that league. There was one very big difference however. Ego (head admin) picked a few elite clans from each country to ensure some champions league like environment. Back then, in '99-'00, there were many teams. So many, that actually chosing a few strong ones made sense. Now, more than 10 years later, this is no longer the case. Teams were honoured to be within the chosen 16. And now? Everything is done in order to attract newbies. There even is a discussion about players who CHEAT AND ALIAS because banning them would "hurt the scene". That's the condition of semi-serious gaming. It's a blabörping joke, admins can't even be admins, they have to bear in mind the general state of the scene

What can be done? I don't know. But please stop talking about Fix and similar players joining a div2 team being wrong. Enjoying QW is a good thing, be it in div1, div2 or div3. Fix certaintly could join any div1 team - but he doesn't. Figure out, why...I think a Villains like system is good. But please, for god's sake, talk about it in a positive way. Saying you would like to ignore div3 players because they're either new, undedicated, stupid or whatever is a bad joke. Do I need to specify what div3 players have contributed to the scene?!

I think an elite-like league is a good idea. But please, show some respect.

Seems like I understand 4on4 less and less every day. I thought that to improve your TP skill rapidly you should participate in a higher skilled clan and learn from the flow of a team that has good teamplay and has players who do what's necessary to do. You simply go with the flow, and it slowly gets "under your skin". So it's a scheme with one low-div guy in a team of 3 other high-div guys.

On the contrary! It has been defended in last EQL that it's actually necessary to have one high-div guy in team of low-div guys (therefore whole team being in low div). It's probably just me, but I simply don't understand what kind of teamplay the team learns from the scenario when this one guy overtakes whole map with a finger in his nose any time he has even the slightest chance to do it. (Edit: and fix is obviously not the one I am talking about here, he's a very special exception - but the rules don't stop him from changing his attitude right tomorrow.)

Also this thread suggests that single low-div players should not be allowed to join otherwise high-div teams.

There is low and there is LOW, it's impossible to set a hard line. But obviously there is a big gap between like.. mors and springs, but between mors and netspider the gap is smaller.

I think you are right that a bad player learns better and faster if he plays with 3 good players, instead of 1 player trying to teach 3 bad players in same team. But that's kind of how the draft works. You get a spread of skill in each team, going from div0 and down, so in the bottom of the team you are bound to have some div2 player, who then would learn faster and better and reach higher skill. IMO this could help pull up a lot of "dead in the water" players in div2, to enjoy some competitive challenging games pushing their skills to the limit.

But at the same time, if you team wanna win - which they do. How can you with good conscience field some div3 player, when you have an obviously better player on the team. It's not charity tournament where we try to pull the bottom denominator up, its a tournament that should help pull the middle class up in a more exciting format where you get rewarded for improving and the competition is tight.

I'd also like to quote cara's comment from earlier:


Also another interesting aspect. How will the draft project affect the idea of being in, or forming new clans?

It's fine to attract newbies, making QW newbie friendly. But somewhere along the way we forgot that our baby QW does need discipline once in a while to not become such a spoiled brat. People get used to the luxury of playing this game for free, free amazingly evolved and coded clients, downloadable/easy costumizable settings, having leagues organized and all that is asked of them is "please show up on time". But some people can't even be bothered with that anymore. It's completely unrealistic to get so much and leave nothing in return, since nothing in life is free. Everything is measured with one currency or another. We have to start somewhere, and somebody needs to have the balls to show some tough love once in a while. It's within the limitations and rules humans thrive, as Day9 stated in one of his shows, imagine playing chess without rules. You'd have a wooden board and wooden figurines and after 2 minutes you'd be bored out of your mind. So I suggest we add more boundaries and start enforcing rules and people will adapt accordingly. Just like in any other society or community. "This is a rule, not a discussion. Case closed.". In my mind it's very plain and simple, but I guess that's where most people disagree. This is probably quite off topic aswell, but most QW discussions of recent tend to boil down to this : )

On a note more topic related:
I think this thread has taken a turn for the worse for no appearent reason. I feel as though some people's posts trigger annoyment with other people making it a slippery slope downhill, annoying more and more people.

This league will improve players skillsets. This league will bring excitement. This league will bring competition. However minorly or majorly will depend on the players and admins making it happen.

The reason for this league, is for the players who have dedicated more time than others to be competitive, to be able to enjoy TDM and have fun once again. If it brings other positive things to the table other than enjoyment, I consider it a bonus.

I hope this clarifies things and puts an end to the ill feelings.

Yeah sorry about that, my post definitely came out pretty negative and offtopic In general I think almost any new league will be good, no matter how restricted - simply because there are not enough tournaments in QW nowadays. So this one should definitely be tried out at least.

Maybe it's natural that the more serious end of the clan scene dies first. I don't see mix tournament reviving it, but replacing it. What's left of div1 in EQL is half mix teams anyway.

Yeah, I don't personally see the problem with Div1 dying since div1 clans normally are former div2 clans. If div1 clans die, players will quit or go another clans and we'll get new div1 clans. So actually div1 can't really die, somebody is always the best. Of course skill level might be lower but in my eyes that's not a problem, it's still super high and even your div0 players were once div2 players. Much bigger problem is if we don't have enough people coming into the scene to replace those who quit. Lately we've had quite a lot of QLive players though.

But bigger picture is if we want to please those 40 div1 players or do we want to please all those 271 QW players. Imo the question is pretty simple.

Why do you keep reacting like we cut off whole scene? We also had a EQL PRO before with invite only teams... did anyone complain about that? No...

There is still competition for div2-3 and there will be in the future. If you want you can make a draft league for the whole scene no one is stopping you, you even have my blessing.

You keep trying to make us look like bad guys, while yourself do nothing about it but complain.. like that is helping the scene.

I remember a few (actually, a lot) years back in Brazil that one of the approachs used by the staff of the tourneys was put a CA server and then make a CA cup. But the teams were not the same as the TDM teams. Basically, people had 2 teams (one for tdm and other for ca).

I'm not a big fan of the CA mod, but I would probably play from time to time, even more in the days that I'm tired and I don't feel like going deep into a strategic game. I somehow find fun and cool the chance to play with players from all divisions and I think the skill gap between all the players becomes a bit lower.

If we had a "Fun CA Cup", mixing players and that stuff, maybe would be cool and it might help people to socialize/increase their skills a bit, or even the feeling of: "hmm, this guys has as good aim... with some tactics, we can be pretty good... let's take him to our tdm team". This was the core idea used in Brazil to break a bit the empire of the top teams and as far as I remember, it worked well.

i've read some messages here, and sadly some put in question the dedication of a higher div player. There may be lots of reasons for a higher div player don't "improve" his game over the years, for example, not having good enough monitor/mouse/pad, personal preference for other game mode (non dm), lack of consistent practice, lack of background in fps games, bad connection, not interested in competition, or simply not enough skill.

Not anyone was born to be a gamer. This is a demanding game. For some ppl is easy to have good aim and good movement. for others, it's damn difficult. No need to disrespect/ignore.


full kiss and love

Hoder "complaints" about his clan being less active than he liked to made me think.
I'm sure he isn't alone in his feeling. im sure there are more players in that situations. Looking at current rankings of EQL, 5 teams in div 2 and 3 didn't play a single match this season - which is about to end. If we do some math:
5 * 6 (average players per team) = 30 players (!)

thirty players! there MUST be more that feel like Hoder. Players that are active, but unlucky enough to be in a clan that doesn't get 4 players at the same time to do their games.
This is a lower div problem. Current EQL system doesn't addresses this problem.
On the other hand, div1 players complain about EQL system, they want MORE high quality action.


We (community) can't afford to accept these "limitations" of current leagues, or the game will die, as ppl lose interest. Apparently, the championship system we have on EQL isn't good for the extremes: div1 arent happy because they want more action, low div3 aren't happy because they can't get their games played.

I see changes in a near future =) more to come...

who reads the last sentence of my previous post may think that i will come up with a solution for these players. I won't.
but i can still question if there's something that can be done.

random thoughts:
* random teams tournament seems a nice approach.
* a special division for top teams, with specific rules:
clans play each other several times; clans can only play their second game when every other clan has played their first game (avoiding big point difference); superdooper playoffs;
* regarding the other teams: the inactive teams have active players in their roster - they should be playing as well. there could be a second round of eql, that would start after the regular season. in this second round, the active players of the inactive teams (which are removed in this round) can join other teams or create a new clan. we could think somesort of bonus for the top 3 teams in the first round to make it interesting.

about this tournament,
i think its a very good iniciative.


my thoughts: (edit: considering that its a mix league)
* do NOT restrict player signup by "skill". Everyone should be able to join, if you don't want to play in a team that has members from a other skill level than yours, don't join.
* no divisions, all teams play each other
* necessary stuff:
- player signup page with: nick, div, preffered time to play (>22cet , <22cet or both);
- algorithm that outputs the teams - this would be done once a season;
- EQL/NQR page can be used
- There must be a rule that prevents the captain of avoiding playing with the worse player in his team. all players must play (unless they become inactive for some reason ofc - this must be reported).

Procedures:
- players upon signup are asked to rate themselves in a 0-5 gamma. 0 being for div0 players, ..., 5 for noobs
- admins pick captains. the number of captains is based on how many players signed up.
- admins decide number of players per team. 5 or 6 seems reasonable, including the captain
- admins execute the algorithm without the chosen captains. the output should be the teams.
- the teams then are setup in EQL/NQR page. a season is ready.


Algorithm:
Inputs: number of players per team, the players, players prefered time to play, players division
Logic: players are divided in prefered time to play, division/skill is taken under consideration to put together teams with the same skill level; there are several ways to do this.


There *will be* uneven teams. goal is to minimize that, but there will be whine. give this new approach a chance, its a new one, probably next season will be finetuned.
the current "divisional" point system may need to change to promote activity, of the team and players. Using all players in team should be rewarded, as well as played games.

*edit: one alternative would be split teams by skill. players from div0, div1 and some (few) div2 in one smaller group (group A), remaining in other group (B). still plenty high quality players in group B, and the gap between players would be minimized.

Someone would need to check this anyway: players upon signup are asked to rate themselves in a 0-5 gamma. 0 being for div0 players, ..., 5 for noobs

Ppl rate themselves in a fucked up way all the time

Well since there won't be an enormous amount of players, perhaps each player should vote the others and then an average is taken out from that.

Sure it's perhaps a half hour work pre season per individual, but not that its too much to ask to get a nice going tournament?

Sounds doable dimman

Sure players rate themselves in fucked up way all the time. thats why admins are for, to correct it =) This is easier part of this whole thing. (my previous post doesn't go into detail about anything, its just a general view)

For example, in qwdl we had a google docs spreadsheet, where a number of ppl contributed to rate the 180 players. based on that rating, they were split in lots of divisions. worked out really well, close games, a definite success. in this league there could be something similar.

screenshot of the spreadsheet: there were nearly 180 players to rate, rated by only 9 players.

Ok havent read this discussion completly but...


* do NOT restrict player signup by "skill". Everyone should be able to join, if you don't want to play in a team that has members from a other skill level than yours, don't join.
* no divisions, all teams play each other

-This cant work. There are just way too noob players that doesn't have messages / mm3 / weapon scripts / irc for communication and they won't even want to use those. Or their mind is just fucked up like Embahs so they will do everything to ruin games or harm scene. And second div0 player with sg is a better than total noob with rl + armor so basically they are just a walking backpacks.
But let's say everyone can join but if there are more players than needed for teams they just wont be elected.

Players upon signup are asked to rate themselves in a 0-5 gamma. 0 being for div0 players, ..., 5 for noobs
-Not needed cause captains are voted from all signed up players. And after that the most voted can pick last. I believe teams will be equal enough after that. Just keep it simple.


But maybe 2nd group could do the job. If there is enough intrest. So first pro league picks up players (for example 10-12 teams). After that remaining group of players will do the same and we get amateur league).

This is one thing that isn't clear for me yet. In this thread, are we talking about a captains league, where the captain CHOOSES the players he wants to, or a mix league, where a team has one captain?
if it's a captains league, we gotta set some rules otherwise it will become a regular clans league. im sure, for example, that if Paradoks is captain, and he could choose any player, he would choose his Slackers teammates. This should not be allowed imo.
Either way, one option to chose the players would be distributing them into pots (like a champions league draw), where the captains stayed in pot 0 and could chose players from other pots, one per pot. for example.


I think so too. The skill difference is just _too much_. However, to prevent inactivity from 2nd group, imo the group should have more players, and more players per team.

plz enlighten me: we talking about a mix league or captains league?

Yep I did not read whole discussion so I was not aware of two different types. I was speaking about captain league where captains can gather a team they like to play with. So yes there could be some clanmates together but thats not that likely It is real important that he picks up some active / experienced mate who can help him. After that they will try to find some promising candidates who to teach.

Let's play with the idea and think about last picker Milton. If there will be 10 clans, 10 best will have to do captain job. So in practice everyone from SR / Fom will be captains. The first (best) available player for pick are from SD, so when Milton, Nitram, Para can choose their first mate there will be left ex div0 guys who are playing in div2 and low div1. Second round top div2, 3rd top-middle div2, 4th milddle, 5th & 6th still middle skilled players from div2. Note that skill level in div2 is really high and wide.

I'd play for sure!

Anyways, i think some div0 players should be captains and pick their team in a fair way.

I'm also thinking that maybe we should try a small tourney over the weekend to start with? I fear inavticity in a league.

I also think that like 1 day tourneys should be done more often! like a frantic 2on2 tourney for just 1 day. online LAN kinda...

Not everyone who signs up will get to play? I mean if there's 5 div0, 10 div1, 20 div2, 8 div3...

Should the teams be the x amount of div0's signing up? or can 2 div1 players = 1 div0?

Read my last post?

You really cant say who are div0, div1 or div2 that's just impossible.

There wont be inactivity if the games are scheduled and team has to play with any lineup. The worst player may got a bit less maps but hey this is not charity and that is the way it is everywhere.
Maybe there could be a player bank and if some team doesn't get 4 they can pick up from bank or from amateur group

im afraid that there will be quite few ppl left to the shores when the titanic is set sail to the seas :/

Two questions would obviously need to be answered before organizing a thing like this:

* Will all levels of players be included in the same league? To include anyone who is willing to play 4on4 feels a bit over the top to me. I think a minimum requirement should be that they have participated in a previous EQL season, even if that is to set the bar too low according to many of the people in this thread. It should be a captains league where they pick the players however, i think this makes for a more interesting and, hopefully, fair selection of teams with minimum effort from admins (only players they would need to roughly rate are the captains basically).

* How many teams will there be? The amount of high skilled players that sign up (and also how many are allowed to sign up, see point above) obvously has high bearing on this as it will dictate the average skill of a team. It's quite useless to include the lower divisions if there will only be 8-12 teams as that will probably fill them up with division ~1 players only.

Checking the original post in this thread i realize Springs thread has been a bit hijacked by these draft league thoughts...

Ive heard there are already plans in motion for a pro-pickup league.
10 teams = not even room for mid-div2 players.
Not organized by eql.