On December 17 2014 06:38 SupLilSon wrote: Envy brings up valid points, but in all honesty the problem seems to lie in his own hands, not the tournament organizers or community's. If you're being overworked then that is your own fault and the fault of C9 management. No one is forcing you to play every single DotA 2 tournament in existence. Citing external pressures such as the desire to qualify for TI is a weak excuse. Teams and their management need to actually take time to plan out their schedules. These are things that are just par for the course in normal jobs. Envy is like a fat kid complaining that he ate too much cake and his stomach hurts.
The casting situation I agree on. The casting at Dreamleague was atrocious. Waga and Draskyl did all they could to salvage the casting but overall it was next to unbearable. Half the time there was some 3k fool talking over them. Casters should not be drunk, especially when their grasp on dota 2 is shaky to begin with. Overall, I think there are some really great casters out there who don't get enough credit (Draskyl for example), and some really poor casters who need to reevaluate what their role in the dota 2 community is (Pyrion for example).
I hope teams and players start to realize that they are the ones most invested in this scene. Sure, I love DotA and think about it/play/watch it every day. But if DotA2 somehow disappeared tomorrow my life would continue mostly unharmed. If you think there are TOO MANY TOURNAMENTS then tell your management to avoid certain events. Don't sign up for starladder if it's going to kill your schedule and leave you exhausted. Let the tier 2 teams who are struggling to find tournaments and net results play in the more grueling events. It just seems so backwards to me that players are now starting to complain that theres TOO MUCH MONEY AND INTEREST in DotA2. Yea it's fucking messy, it's disorganized, it's chaotic but that's because there's been a boom in interest and money. Like damn, EE you came from almost nothing and now that you're near the top you forgot where you came from. Maybe I'm just a dumbass forum poster who has no fucking idea what goes on in the mind of a top player but I'd really like to hear what some tier 2 players think about this situation. I want to hear what the dota 2 scene is like from someone who is still hungry.
How do you plan out a schedule for tournaments you aren't sure you're going to the LAN for? Furthermore, going to TI is not an external pressure, it is THE external pressure. Every pro in the world wants to go to TI and that's the goal of every team in the world. It's hardly trivial. I doubt anyone in the world is more hungry than these top teams because if they were, they'd be beating them.
They have also been dropping out lately. The problem is that when the top teams drop out, viewership falls off a cliff, which in turn jeopardize future iterations and prize pools of the tournament
you can not complain about oversaturation and at the same time want every terrible run tournament to stay alive for all eternity. when the viewership drops it will be decided wether the dota scene is large enough to support lower tier tournaments on an equally professional level. (as if any tournament is run by professionals, LOL). if that is the case, great, dota is on a really good way to stay for years to come. if it is not, its also fine because dota will be cut down to a healthier state and will continue the same as it did before.
I'm not a fan of every terribly run tournament, but I'm just pointing out how all the "more tournament good" bulls are wrong in saying that these top teams should just drop, because if they did; this tournaments would die and T2 teams (the ones they claim to be in support of) would be hurt even more
Tournaments don't suddenly just die because 1 or 2 top teams drop out and they lose some viewers. If they really close shop after one such incident then obviously their budget was fucking terribly planned out. Yes, some tournaments will be relegated to "tier 2", probably the more poorly run ones. Those smaller tournaments will still exist for the T2 teams. A player like Kefka probably wouldn't even be able to call himself a pro if there wasn't oversaturation. Look at the league scene, if you're not in an LCS team or a team vying for an LCS spot then you are nothing. There's no independent tournament to make your name. You either are either on a top 10 (or w/e) team in your region, make decent money streaming, or you are nothing.
On December 17 2014 06:38 SupLilSon wrote: Envy brings up valid points, but in all honesty the problem seems to lie in his own hands, not the tournament organizers or community's. If you're being overworked then that is your own fault and the fault of C9 management. No one is forcing you to play every single DotA 2 tournament in existence. Citing external pressures such as the desire to qualify for TI is a weak excuse. Teams and their management need to actually take time to plan out their schedules. These are things that are just par for the course in normal jobs. Envy is like a fat kid complaining that he ate too much cake and his stomach hurts.
The casting situation I agree on. The casting at Dreamleague was atrocious. Waga and Draskyl did all they could to salvage the casting but overall it was next to unbearable. Half the time there was some 3k fool talking over them. Casters should not be drunk, especially when their grasp on dota 2 is shaky to begin with. Overall, I think there are some really great casters out there who don't get enough credit (Draskyl for example), and some really poor casters who need to reevaluate what their role in the dota 2 community is (Pyrion for example).
I hope teams and players start to realize that they are the ones most invested in this scene. Sure, I love DotA and think about it/play/watch it every day. But if DotA2 somehow disappeared tomorrow my life would continue mostly unharmed. If you think there are TOO MANY TOURNAMENTS then tell your management to avoid certain events. Don't sign up for starladder if it's going to kill your schedule and leave you exhausted. Let the tier 2 teams who are struggling to find tournaments and net results play in the more grueling events. It just seems so backwards to me that players are now starting to complain that theres TOO MUCH MONEY AND INTEREST in DotA2. Yea it's fucking messy, it's disorganized, it's chaotic but that's because there's been a boom in interest and money. Like damn, EE you came from almost nothing and now that you're near the top you forgot where you came from. Maybe I'm just a dumbass forum poster who has no fucking idea what goes on in the mind of a top player but I'd really like to hear what some tier 2 players think about this situation. I want to hear what the dota 2 scene is like from someone who is still hungry.
How do you plan out a schedule for tournaments you aren't sure you're going to the LAN for? Furthermore, going to TI is not an external pressure, it is THE external pressure. Every pro in the world wants to go to TI and that's the goal of every team in the world. It's hardly trivial. I doubt anyone in the world is more hungry than these top teams because if they were, they'd be beating them.
They have also been dropping out lately. The problem is that when the top teams drop out, viewership falls off a cliff, which in turn jeopardize future iterations and prize pools of the tournament
you can not complain about oversaturation and at the same time want every terrible run tournament to stay alive for all eternity. when the viewership drops it will be decided wether the dota scene is large enough to support lower tier tournaments on an equally professional level. (as if any tournament is run by professionals, LOL). if that is the case, great, dota is on a really good way to stay for years to come. if it is not, its also fine because dota will be cut down to a healthier state and will continue the same as it did before.
I'm not a fan of every terribly run tournament, but I'm just pointing out how all the "more tournament good" bulls are wrong in saying that these top teams should just drop, because if they did; this tournaments would die and T2 teams (the ones they claim to be in support of) would be hurt even more
well, if that is the case the dota2 scene isnt strong enough to support T2 teams. that would be sad (and i dont believe it, but that is something to debate), but couldnt be changed. you can not expect the top teams to play an unhealthy amount of games, especially lan games all over the world, just so that less successfull teams can live the life of progamers.
oh and you keep mentioning EG back in 2013. with EG back then it is a bit different than with EG/C9 today. first, they werent really all that dominant. they were a strong team and probably the strongest in NA, but dignitas and liquid were somewhat close by. but the most important part was that EG stopped playing for months. they didnt play less like dropping out of a few tournaments, they werent playing at all until it was relatively late and then they werent ahead of liquid and dignitas any longer. if you want to compare it to today, EG had to stop playing until mid april and at the same time another NA teams rises to power and wins multiple international tournaments and places top3 in all others. that is very unlikely.
On December 17 2014 01:16 an00bis wrote: Not sure if posted yet but an interesting video/different perspective
While I feel like EE brought up some really valid points in this blog, I also feel like this video is absolutely spot on. Liked the analysis and the solutions he's giving. Seems to me like there are parallels to be drawn with pretty much every single job out there and that esport has to walk that path too.
Is it just me or did the scene begin to stink after Ti4? Like before that there were medium to large scale tournaments every fortnight or month or so, but nothing too oversaturated; after ti4 and the great chinese reshuffle I feel like I'm either always watching the same teams over and over (c9, EG, secret, tinker) or tier 2 teams I never even heard of before. Before Ti4 my friends and I would be like "Oh my gosh, VG is playing tomorrow! i'm gonna stay up for it!" but now it's more like "oh EG tomorrow again? who cares, we'll have another EG game the day after".
Feels like this chinese reshuffle just totally decimated the chinese scene too. It's so difficult to catch chinese tournaments with all of the big names, because most of the teams just seem to be in shambles and I can't even imagine who is in which team anymore.
I agree with most of EE's points. I hate to caster bash (I really love some of them like LD, gotta give that guy points for sincerity) but it's true that casters seem to care a lot less too with the tournament oversaturation.
On December 17 2014 06:38 SupLilSon wrote: Envy brings up valid points, but in all honesty the problem seems to lie in his own hands, not the tournament organizers or community's. If you're being overworked then that is your own fault and the fault of C9 management. No one is forcing you to play every single DotA 2 tournament in existence. Citing external pressures such as the desire to qualify for TI is a weak excuse. Teams and their management need to actually take time to plan out their schedules. These are things that are just par for the course in normal jobs. Envy is like a fat kid complaining that he ate too much cake and his stomach hurts.
The casting situation I agree on. The casting at Dreamleague was atrocious. Waga and Draskyl did all they could to salvage the casting but overall it was next to unbearable. Half the time there was some 3k fool talking over them. Casters should not be drunk, especially when their grasp on dota 2 is shaky to begin with. Overall, I think there are some really great casters out there who don't get enough credit (Draskyl for example), and some really poor casters who need to reevaluate what their role in the dota 2 community is (Pyrion for example).
I hope teams and players start to realize that they are the ones most invested in this scene. Sure, I love DotA and think about it/play/watch it every day. But if DotA2 somehow disappeared tomorrow my life would continue mostly unharmed. If you think there are TOO MANY TOURNAMENTS then tell your management to avoid certain events. Don't sign up for starladder if it's going to kill your schedule and leave you exhausted. Let the tier 2 teams who are struggling to find tournaments and net results play in the more grueling events. It just seems so backwards to me that players are now starting to complain that theres TOO MUCH MONEY AND INTEREST in DotA2. Yea it's fucking messy, it's disorganized, it's chaotic but that's because there's been a boom in interest and money. Like damn, EE you came from almost nothing and now that you're near the top you forgot where you came from. Maybe I'm just a dumbass forum poster who has no fucking idea what goes on in the mind of a top player but I'd really like to hear what some tier 2 players think about this situation. I want to hear what the dota 2 scene is like from someone who is still hungry.
How do you plan out a schedule for tournaments you aren't sure you're going to the LAN for? Furthermore, going to TI is not an external pressure, it is THE external pressure. Every pro in the world wants to go to TI and that's the goal of every team in the world. It's hardly trivial. I doubt anyone in the world is more hungry than these top teams because if they were, they'd be beating them.
They have also been dropping out lately. The problem is that when the top teams drop out, viewership falls off a cliff, which in turn jeopardize future iterations and prize pools of the tournament
you can not complain about oversaturation and at the same time want every terrible run tournament to stay alive for all eternity. when the viewership drops it will be decided wether the dota scene is large enough to support lower tier tournaments on an equally professional level. (as if any tournament is run by professionals, LOL). if that is the case, great, dota is on a really good way to stay for years to come. if it is not, its also fine because dota will be cut down to a healthier state and will continue the same as it did before.
I'm not a fan of every terribly run tournament, but I'm just pointing out how all the "more tournament good" bulls are wrong in saying that these top teams should just drop, because if they did; this tournaments would die and T2 teams (the ones they claim to be in support of) would be hurt even more
well, if that is the case the dota2 scene isnt strong enough to support T2 teams. that would be sad (and i dont believe it, but that is something to debate), but couldnt be changed. you can not expect the top teams to play an unhealthy amount of games, especially lan games all over the world, just so that less successfull teams can live the life of progamers.
oh and you keep mentioning EG back in 2013. with EG back then it is a bit different than with EG/C9 today. first, they werent really all that dominant. they were a strong team and probably the strongest in NA, but dignitas and liquid were somewhat close by. but the most important part was that EG stopped playing for months. they didnt play less like dropping out of a few tournaments, they werent playing at all until it was relatively late and then they werent ahead of liquid and dignitas any longer. if you want to compare it to today, EG had to stop playing until mid april and at the same time another NA teams rises to power and wins multiple international tournaments and places top3 in all others. that is very unlikely.
I don't get what you're arguing lol? I fundamentally agree with you, but you seem to ignore all the people who are saying explicitly that oversaturation doesn't exist or in the case of ixmike that EE is an idiot and that more prize money is good.
The point about EG is not an apples to apples comparison to the current scene. It is more that teams are incredibly cognizant of the results they need to put up to make it to TI. Every tournament combined would not equal the TI prizepool and so obtaining more high finishes will certainly help you make it into TI. It's not like Valve hasn't rejected the hot team of the moment from even getting a TI qualifier invite amirite
On December 17 2014 06:38 SupLilSon wrote: Envy brings up valid points, but in all honesty the problem seems to lie in his own hands, not the tournament organizers or community's. If you're being overworked then that is your own fault and the fault of C9 management. No one is forcing you to play every single DotA 2 tournament in existence. Citing external pressures such as the desire to qualify for TI is a weak excuse. Teams and their management need to actually take time to plan out their schedules. These are things that are just par for the course in normal jobs. Envy is like a fat kid complaining that he ate too much cake and his stomach hurts.
The casting situation I agree on. The casting at Dreamleague was atrocious. Waga and Draskyl did all they could to salvage the casting but overall it was next to unbearable. Half the time there was some 3k fool talking over them. Casters should not be drunk, especially when their grasp on dota 2 is shaky to begin with. Overall, I think there are some really great casters out there who don't get enough credit (Draskyl for example), and some really poor casters who need to reevaluate what their role in the dota 2 community is (Pyrion for example).
I hope teams and players start to realize that they are the ones most invested in this scene. Sure, I love DotA and think about it/play/watch it every day. But if DotA2 somehow disappeared tomorrow my life would continue mostly unharmed. If you think there are TOO MANY TOURNAMENTS then tell your management to avoid certain events. Don't sign up for starladder if it's going to kill your schedule and leave you exhausted. Let the tier 2 teams who are struggling to find tournaments and net results play in the more grueling events. It just seems so backwards to me that players are now starting to complain that theres TOO MUCH MONEY AND INTEREST in DotA2. Yea it's fucking messy, it's disorganized, it's chaotic but that's because there's been a boom in interest and money. Like damn, EE you came from almost nothing and now that you're near the top you forgot where you came from. Maybe I'm just a dumbass forum poster who has no fucking idea what goes on in the mind of a top player but I'd really like to hear what some tier 2 players think about this situation. I want to hear what the dota 2 scene is like from someone who is still hungry.
How do you plan out a schedule for tournaments you aren't sure you're going to the LAN for? Furthermore, going to TI is not an external pressure, it is THE external pressure. Every pro in the world wants to go to TI and that's the goal of every team in the world. It's hardly trivial. I doubt anyone in the world is more hungry than these top teams because if they were, they'd be beating them.
They have also been dropping out lately. The problem is that when the top teams drop out, viewership falls off a cliff, which in turn jeopardize future iterations and prize pools of the tournament
you can not complain about oversaturation and at the same time want every terrible run tournament to stay alive for all eternity. when the viewership drops it will be decided wether the dota scene is large enough to support lower tier tournaments on an equally professional level. (as if any tournament is run by professionals, LOL). if that is the case, great, dota is on a really good way to stay for years to come. if it is not, its also fine because dota will be cut down to a healthier state and will continue the same as it did before.
I'm not a fan of every terribly run tournament, but I'm just pointing out how all the "more tournament good" bulls are wrong in saying that these top teams should just drop, because if they did; this tournaments would die and T2 teams (the ones they claim to be in support of) would be hurt even more
Tournaments don't suddenly just die because 1 or 2 top teams drop out and they lose some viewers. If they really close shop after one such incident then obviously their budget was fucking terribly planned out. Yes, some tournaments will be relegated to "tier 2", probably the more poorly run ones. Those smaller tournaments will still exist for the T2 teams. A player like Kefka probably wouldn't even be able to call himself a pro if there wasn't oversaturation. Look at the league scene, if you're not in an LCS team or a team vying for an LCS spot then you are nothing. There's no independent tournament to make your name. You either are either on a top 10 (or w/e) team in your region, make decent money streaming, or you are nothing.
Teams like 4ASC and VPP gain a lot more playing C9/EG/Secret than the other way around. I hope T2 tourneys don't die out but you have stuff like Dota Pit League/Synergy League etc. that are high paying lan tournaments and don't get much buzz on any dota site
League has a really structured ladder system where the top 5 stacks are moved up into the challenger division (think of EPL or La Liga with lower division teams that get promoted). The winners then move up into LCS and replace the lowest finishing teams in LCS. League if anything, is the most structured and has the least tournaments. It's much simpler to get noticed in League because there is only 1 way of developing and it's confined to whatever region your team is based in. It's also relatively fair and quite transparent as to how to get into the "pro circuit" (though it has been taken advantage by Chinese b-teams lol)
Speaking from my personal opinion, it really pisses me off when casters are like "What is he doing?!" when they think someone's doing something stupid (LD is guilty of this.... OOOH SHIT IM CALLIN U OUT, jk I love u ld but it's pretty rude to do that). The players KNOW they're being watched by THOUSANDS of people, they don't wanna lose, and they're under the stress of the shit-show rooming conditions EE talked about. They should be allowed to do stupid shit.
Another thing most casters don't seem to keep in mind is that players don't have map-wide view like they do. So saying "Why is he tping right there... blahblahblah" is also pretty fucking rude, they don't KNOW that there is a player hunting them (they might, but still).
Also, as EE pointed out, the casters aren't actually at professional level either. They don't necessarily understand what players are doing as well as they probably should.
Onto the lack of viewer support. I feel that tournaments abuse the ticket feature. EVERY tournament has a ticket feature that you HAVE to purchase to watch in-game. But, why watch in-game for $5 when I can watch it for free (sort of, bandwidth costs) on Twitch? Exactly, nothing. While Twitch may attract viewers, they're still doing it knowing that we have no potential reason to purchase the ticket based solely on increasing the prize pool by 2 whopping dollars.
This brings me on to another point. Tournaments are way to fucking greedy. We're charged $5 to watch in-game for EVERY tournament, and only $2.50 of that ACTUALLY goes to the prize pool. Yeah I get it, production costs, other stuff, blah blah blah. But we (as players) don't really give a fuck about the price that it costs to point a camera at your face and tell us about the game, and not go into the game until 2 picks and bans have already happened. We want to help the players, don't get me wrong, but what the hell is $2.50 gonna do to a prize pool? All I've managed to do is give about 70% to the winning team, and who knows how much to the rest. What if I wan't to contribute to my favorite team's chunk of money?
To you, the professional players, if there's too many tournaments, make the games fun to watch then. Pick fun heroes, that aren't game losing. Pick heroes that haven't even been considered, like Crystal Maiden (jk ee). People pick Skywrath because he has a silence that makes extra magic damage apply, so why isn't Pugna being picked up? Skywrath is COMPLETELY countered by BKB, but so is Leshrac, why isn't he being picked up? He has a stun, hits towers, and has an AOE toggleable ult. He offers MUCH more than Skywrath does in my opinion.
To the people who run tournaments, why the hell are you giving Dota 2 Lounge and Esportsbets.com all the betting fun? I see a pretty fucking good revenue with sites like that. Just let people bet on the stuff from your tournament, and take a percentage of the losing sides bets, and distribute the rest among the winning betters, fairly of course. It'd take some math to do, but you'd just have to get a ratio for how much the person wins back per dollar spent (conversions SHOULD apply. 1 euro does NOT equal a dollar). Then take half of the percentage you took, and apply it to the prize pool... FOR EVERY GAME. Viewers are enticed to bet because they can win money, and in turn, you make money.
Also to people who run tournaments, more teams and more games does not increase viewership. We want to see GOOD teams play against each other in such a way that it is EXCITING. If we watch C9 vs EG 6 times in 3 days, we don't wanna watch game 4, or 5, or 6. Maybe not even the first 3 games. Another thing, SPACE THE TOURNAMENTS OUT. There's literally like 34013414018 tournaments in the Winter, and oh shit come January and we have like 3 between then and TI. A tournament in March or April will most definitely not ruin the upcoming TI, and who knows you might attract viewers for being the only tournament happening in Spring (now that I said that inb4 104192130129 tournaments in Spring, sorry pros).
I'm very curious about the player association thing. Seeing how OP describes the situation in DotA2 for top tier players in DotA2 right now, i can see it really working if they truly all rally together and start to demand for real things.
Theres so many disconnects they aren't bothering with pausing and just playing 4/3v5...Literally exactly what EE said...The casters have no idea what to say and are obviously holding back saying what they are thinking.
This is really embarrassing...Especially when EE just posted about this.
Sure it's over 10 minutes of Dotapits rules. But VP don't even seem that bothered anyway...
On December 17 2014 08:46 Talyk wrote: IS ANYONE WATCHING THIS DOTAPIT GAME? TT vs VP?
Theres so many disconnects they aren't bothering with pausing and just playing 4/3v5...Literally exactly what EE said...The casters have no idea what to say and are obviously holding back saying what they are thinking.
This is really embarrassing...Especially when EE just posted about this.
Sure it's over 10 minutes of Dotapits rules. But VP don't even seem that bothered anyway...
no im not, i didnt even realise the two were playing
While EE does have a strong point in tournament over-saturation I feel it ultimately goes down to the team's decision to attend every StarLadder, MLG, DreamHack, etc. I can't tell you how many tournaments are going on right now and the feeling of being overwhelmed makes it nearly impossible to follow every storyline and team. At the same time, as a team if you feel you need to space out, make that decision rather than take the greedy path and attend all of them.
Just adding my 2 cents, the players/teams should take responsibility for their own schedule and losses due to whatever - fatigue, ping, etc. If they think its unfair then don't play and risk the TI invite or play a few and make sure you win.
Not caring about the game is their own problem, and the more they lose the bigger the risk their reputation and invite to TI becomes. Casters should also take pride and ownership of their own casts, if they don't care bout the games or teams have other lesser known casters cast it. Over-saturation is not an issue, viewers watch what they want. End of the day its just competition and the best survive.
So you bitch about casters being unprofessional (which is bad) while you say that you dont care about the games you play (which is unprofessional, especially when you say it out loud) and your team (i dont know if it was Aui2000 or Bone7) said at BTS2 that you do everything to win and bitching about handwarmers is part of it (which is hypocritical).
And if its too many tournaments, why not be restrictive? If teams dont want to play in that many tournaments fewer will pop up.
On December 17 2014 06:38 SupLilSon wrote: Envy brings up valid points, but in all honesty the problem seems to lie in his own hands, not the tournament organizers or community's. If you're being overworked then that is your own fault and the fault of C9 management. No one is forcing you to play every single DotA 2 tournament in existence. Citing external pressures such as the desire to qualify for TI is a weak excuse. Teams and their management need to actually take time to plan out their schedules. These are things that are just par for the course in normal jobs. Envy is like a fat kid complaining that he ate too much cake and his stomach hurts.
The casting situation I agree on. The casting at Dreamleague was atrocious. Waga and Draskyl did all they could to salvage the casting but overall it was next to unbearable. Half the time there was some 3k fool talking over them. Casters should not be drunk, especially when their grasp on dota 2 is shaky to begin with. Overall, I think there are some really great casters out there who don't get enough credit (Draskyl for example), and some really poor casters who need to reevaluate what their role in the dota 2 community is (Pyrion for example).
I hope teams and players start to realize that they are the ones most invested in this scene. Sure, I love DotA and think about it/play/watch it every day. But if DotA2 somehow disappeared tomorrow my life would continue mostly unharmed. If you think there are TOO MANY TOURNAMENTS then tell your management to avoid certain events. Don't sign up for starladder if it's going to kill your schedule and leave you exhausted. Let the tier 2 teams who are struggling to find tournaments and net results play in the more grueling events. It just seems so backwards to me that players are now starting to complain that theres TOO MUCH MONEY AND INTEREST in DotA2. Yea it's fucking messy, it's disorganized, it's chaotic but that's because there's been a boom in interest and money. Like damn, EE you came from almost nothing and now that you're near the top you forgot where you came from. Maybe I'm just a dumbass forum poster who has no fucking idea what goes on in the mind of a top player but I'd really like to hear what some tier 2 players think about this situation. I want to hear what the dota 2 scene is like from someone who is still hungry.
How do you plan out a schedule for tournaments you aren't sure you're going to the LAN for? Furthermore, going to TI is not an external pressure, it is THE external pressure. Every pro in the world wants to go to TI and that's the goal of every team in the world. It's hardly trivial. I doubt anyone in the world is more hungry than these top teams because if they were, they'd be beating them.
They have also been dropping out lately. The problem is that when the top teams drop out, viewership falls off a cliff, which in turn jeopardize future iterations and prize pools of the tournament
you can not complain about oversaturation and at the same time want every terrible run tournament to stay alive for all eternity. when the viewership drops it will be decided wether the dota scene is large enough to support lower tier tournaments on an equally professional level. (as if any tournament is run by professionals, LOL). if that is the case, great, dota is on a really good way to stay for years to come. if it is not, its also fine because dota will be cut down to a healthier state and will continue the same as it did before.
I'm not a fan of every terribly run tournament, but I'm just pointing out how all the "more tournament good" bulls are wrong in saying that these top teams should just drop, because if they did; this tournaments would die and T2 teams (the ones they claim to be in support of) would be hurt even more
well, if that is the case the dota2 scene isnt strong enough to support T2 teams. that would be sad (and i dont believe it, but that is something to debate), but couldnt be changed. you can not expect the top teams to play an unhealthy amount of games, especially lan games all over the world, just so that less successfull teams can live the life of progamers.
oh and you keep mentioning EG back in 2013. with EG back then it is a bit different than with EG/C9 today. first, they werent really all that dominant. they were a strong team and probably the strongest in NA, but dignitas and liquid were somewhat close by. but the most important part was that EG stopped playing for months. they didnt play less like dropping out of a few tournaments, they werent playing at all until it was relatively late and then they werent ahead of liquid and dignitas any longer. if you want to compare it to today, EG had to stop playing until mid april and at the same time another NA teams rises to power and wins multiple international tournaments and places top3 in all others. that is very unlikely.
I don't get what you're arguing lol? I fundamentally agree with you, but you seem to ignore all the people who are saying explicitly that oversaturation doesn't exist or in the case of ixmike that EE is an idiot and that more prize money is good.
The point about EG is not an apples to apples comparison to the current scene. It is more that teams are incredibly cognizant of the results they need to put up to make it to TI. Every tournament combined would not equal the TI prizepool and so obtaining more high finishes will certainly help you make it into TI. It's not like Valve hasn't rejected the hot team of the moment from even getting a TI qualifier invite amirite
On December 17 2014 06:38 SupLilSon wrote: Envy brings up valid points, but in all honesty the problem seems to lie in his own hands, not the tournament organizers or community's. If you're being overworked then that is your own fault and the fault of C9 management. No one is forcing you to play every single DotA 2 tournament in existence. Citing external pressures such as the desire to qualify for TI is a weak excuse. Teams and their management need to actually take time to plan out their schedules. These are things that are just par for the course in normal jobs. Envy is like a fat kid complaining that he ate too much cake and his stomach hurts.
The casting situation I agree on. The casting at Dreamleague was atrocious. Waga and Draskyl did all they could to salvage the casting but overall it was next to unbearable. Half the time there was some 3k fool talking over them. Casters should not be drunk, especially when their grasp on dota 2 is shaky to begin with. Overall, I think there are some really great casters out there who don't get enough credit (Draskyl for example), and some really poor casters who need to reevaluate what their role in the dota 2 community is (Pyrion for example).
I hope teams and players start to realize that they are the ones most invested in this scene. Sure, I love DotA and think about it/play/watch it every day. But if DotA2 somehow disappeared tomorrow my life would continue mostly unharmed. If you think there are TOO MANY TOURNAMENTS then tell your management to avoid certain events. Don't sign up for starladder if it's going to kill your schedule and leave you exhausted. Let the tier 2 teams who are struggling to find tournaments and net results play in the more grueling events. It just seems so backwards to me that players are now starting to complain that theres TOO MUCH MONEY AND INTEREST in DotA2. Yea it's fucking messy, it's disorganized, it's chaotic but that's because there's been a boom in interest and money. Like damn, EE you came from almost nothing and now that you're near the top you forgot where you came from. Maybe I'm just a dumbass forum poster who has no fucking idea what goes on in the mind of a top player but I'd really like to hear what some tier 2 players think about this situation. I want to hear what the dota 2 scene is like from someone who is still hungry.
How do you plan out a schedule for tournaments you aren't sure you're going to the LAN for? Furthermore, going to TI is not an external pressure, it is THE external pressure. Every pro in the world wants to go to TI and that's the goal of every team in the world. It's hardly trivial. I doubt anyone in the world is more hungry than these top teams because if they were, they'd be beating them.
They have also been dropping out lately. The problem is that when the top teams drop out, viewership falls off a cliff, which in turn jeopardize future iterations and prize pools of the tournament
you can not complain about oversaturation and at the same time want every terrible run tournament to stay alive for all eternity. when the viewership drops it will be decided wether the dota scene is large enough to support lower tier tournaments on an equally professional level. (as if any tournament is run by professionals, LOL). if that is the case, great, dota is on a really good way to stay for years to come. if it is not, its also fine because dota will be cut down to a healthier state and will continue the same as it did before.
I'm not a fan of every terribly run tournament, but I'm just pointing out how all the "more tournament good" bulls are wrong in saying that these top teams should just drop, because if they did; this tournaments would die and T2 teams (the ones they claim to be in support of) would be hurt even more
Tournaments don't suddenly just die because 1 or 2 top teams drop out and they lose some viewers. If they really close shop after one such incident then obviously their budget was fucking terribly planned out. Yes, some tournaments will be relegated to "tier 2", probably the more poorly run ones. Those smaller tournaments will still exist for the T2 teams. A player like Kefka probably wouldn't even be able to call himself a pro if there wasn't oversaturation. Look at the league scene, if you're not in an LCS team or a team vying for an LCS spot then you are nothing. There's no independent tournament to make your name. You either are either on a top 10 (or w/e) team in your region, make decent money streaming, or you are nothing.
Teams like 4ASC and VPP gain a lot more playing C9/EG/Secret than the other way around. I hope T2 tourneys don't die out but you have stuff like Dota Pit League/Synergy League etc. that are high paying lan tournaments and don't get much buzz on any dota site
League has a really structured ladder system where the top 5 stacks are moved up into the challenger division (think of EPL or La Liga with lower division teams that get promoted). The winners then move up into LCS and replace the lowest finishing teams in LCS. League if anything, is the most structured and has the least tournaments. It's much simpler to get noticed in League because there is only 1 way of developing and it's confined to whatever region your team is based in. It's also relatively fair and quite transparent as to how to get into the "pro circuit" (though it has been taken advantage by Chinese b-teams lol)
which hot team of the moment was rejected by valve ? if you say kaipi, i am just gonna laugh
On December 17 2014 06:38 SupLilSon wrote: Envy brings up valid points, but in all honesty the problem seems to lie in his own hands, not the tournament organizers or community's. If you're being overworked then that is your own fault and the fault of C9 management. No one is forcing you to play every single DotA 2 tournament in existence. Citing external pressures such as the desire to qualify for TI is a weak excuse. Teams and their management need to actually take time to plan out their schedules. These are things that are just par for the course in normal jobs. Envy is like a fat kid complaining that he ate too much cake and his stomach hurts.
The casting situation I agree on. The casting at Dreamleague was atrocious. Waga and Draskyl did all they could to salvage the casting but overall it was next to unbearable. Half the time there was some 3k fool talking over them. Casters should not be drunk, especially when their grasp on dota 2 is shaky to begin with. Overall, I think there are some really great casters out there who don't get enough credit (Draskyl for example), and some really poor casters who need to reevaluate what their role in the dota 2 community is (Pyrion for example).
I hope teams and players start to realize that they are the ones most invested in this scene. Sure, I love DotA and think about it/play/watch it every day. But if DotA2 somehow disappeared tomorrow my life would continue mostly unharmed. If you think there are TOO MANY TOURNAMENTS then tell your management to avoid certain events. Don't sign up for starladder if it's going to kill your schedule and leave you exhausted. Let the tier 2 teams who are struggling to find tournaments and net results play in the more grueling events. It just seems so backwards to me that players are now starting to complain that theres TOO MUCH MONEY AND INTEREST in DotA2. Yea it's fucking messy, it's disorganized, it's chaotic but that's because there's been a boom in interest and money. Like damn, EE you came from almost nothing and now that you're near the top you forgot where you came from. Maybe I'm just a dumbass forum poster who has no fucking idea what goes on in the mind of a top player but I'd really like to hear what some tier 2 players think about this situation. I want to hear what the dota 2 scene is like from someone who is still hungry.
How do you plan out a schedule for tournaments you aren't sure you're going to the LAN for? Furthermore, going to TI is not an external pressure, it is THE external pressure. Every pro in the world wants to go to TI and that's the goal of every team in the world. It's hardly trivial. I doubt anyone in the world is more hungry than these top teams because if they were, they'd be beating them.
They have also been dropping out lately. The problem is that when the top teams drop out, viewership falls off a cliff, which in turn jeopardize future iterations and prize pools of the tournament
you can not complain about oversaturation and at the same time want every terrible run tournament to stay alive for all eternity. when the viewership drops it will be decided wether the dota scene is large enough to support lower tier tournaments on an equally professional level. (as if any tournament is run by professionals, LOL). if that is the case, great, dota is on a really good way to stay for years to come. if it is not, its also fine because dota will be cut down to a healthier state and will continue the same as it did before.
I'm not a fan of every terribly run tournament, but I'm just pointing out how all the "more tournament good" bulls are wrong in saying that these top teams should just drop, because if they did; this tournaments would die and T2 teams (the ones they claim to be in support of) would be hurt even more
well, if that is the case the dota2 scene isnt strong enough to support T2 teams. that would be sad (and i dont believe it, but that is something to debate), but couldnt be changed. you can not expect the top teams to play an unhealthy amount of games, especially lan games all over the world, just so that less successfull teams can live the life of progamers.
oh and you keep mentioning EG back in 2013. with EG back then it is a bit different than with EG/C9 today. first, they werent really all that dominant. they were a strong team and probably the strongest in NA, but dignitas and liquid were somewhat close by. but the most important part was that EG stopped playing for months. they didnt play less like dropping out of a few tournaments, they werent playing at all until it was relatively late and then they werent ahead of liquid and dignitas any longer. if you want to compare it to today, EG had to stop playing until mid april and at the same time another NA teams rises to power and wins multiple international tournaments and places top3 in all others. that is very unlikely.
I don't get what you're arguing lol? I fundamentally agree with you, but you seem to ignore all the people who are saying explicitly that oversaturation doesn't exist or in the case of ixmike that EE is an idiot and that more prize money is good.
The point about EG is not an apples to apples comparison to the current scene. It is more that teams are incredibly cognizant of the results they need to put up to make it to TI. Every tournament combined would not equal the TI prizepool and so obtaining more high finishes will certainly help you make it into TI. It's not like Valve hasn't rejected the hot team of the moment from even getting a TI qualifier invite amirite
On December 17 2014 07:31 SupLilSon wrote:
On December 17 2014 07:12 bagels21 wrote:
On December 17 2014 07:06 hfglgg wrote:
On December 17 2014 06:45 bagels21 wrote:
On December 17 2014 06:38 SupLilSon wrote: Envy brings up valid points, but in all honesty the problem seems to lie in his own hands, not the tournament organizers or community's. If you're being overworked then that is your own fault and the fault of C9 management. No one is forcing you to play every single DotA 2 tournament in existence. Citing external pressures such as the desire to qualify for TI is a weak excuse. Teams and their management need to actually take time to plan out their schedules. These are things that are just par for the course in normal jobs. Envy is like a fat kid complaining that he ate too much cake and his stomach hurts.
The casting situation I agree on. The casting at Dreamleague was atrocious. Waga and Draskyl did all they could to salvage the casting but overall it was next to unbearable. Half the time there was some 3k fool talking over them. Casters should not be drunk, especially when their grasp on dota 2 is shaky to begin with. Overall, I think there are some really great casters out there who don't get enough credit (Draskyl for example), and some really poor casters who need to reevaluate what their role in the dota 2 community is (Pyrion for example).
I hope teams and players start to realize that they are the ones most invested in this scene. Sure, I love DotA and think about it/play/watch it every day. But if DotA2 somehow disappeared tomorrow my life would continue mostly unharmed. If you think there are TOO MANY TOURNAMENTS then tell your management to avoid certain events. Don't sign up for starladder if it's going to kill your schedule and leave you exhausted. Let the tier 2 teams who are struggling to find tournaments and net results play in the more grueling events. It just seems so backwards to me that players are now starting to complain that theres TOO MUCH MONEY AND INTEREST in DotA2. Yea it's fucking messy, it's disorganized, it's chaotic but that's because there's been a boom in interest and money. Like damn, EE you came from almost nothing and now that you're near the top you forgot where you came from. Maybe I'm just a dumbass forum poster who has no fucking idea what goes on in the mind of a top player but I'd really like to hear what some tier 2 players think about this situation. I want to hear what the dota 2 scene is like from someone who is still hungry.
How do you plan out a schedule for tournaments you aren't sure you're going to the LAN for? Furthermore, going to TI is not an external pressure, it is THE external pressure. Every pro in the world wants to go to TI and that's the goal of every team in the world. It's hardly trivial. I doubt anyone in the world is more hungry than these top teams because if they were, they'd be beating them.
They have also been dropping out lately. The problem is that when the top teams drop out, viewership falls off a cliff, which in turn jeopardize future iterations and prize pools of the tournament
you can not complain about oversaturation and at the same time want every terrible run tournament to stay alive for all eternity. when the viewership drops it will be decided wether the dota scene is large enough to support lower tier tournaments on an equally professional level. (as if any tournament is run by professionals, LOL). if that is the case, great, dota is on a really good way to stay for years to come. if it is not, its also fine because dota will be cut down to a healthier state and will continue the same as it did before.
I'm not a fan of every terribly run tournament, but I'm just pointing out how all the "more tournament good" bulls are wrong in saying that these top teams should just drop, because if they did; this tournaments would die and T2 teams (the ones they claim to be in support of) would be hurt even more
Tournaments don't suddenly just die because 1 or 2 top teams drop out and they lose some viewers. If they really close shop after one such incident then obviously their budget was fucking terribly planned out. Yes, some tournaments will be relegated to "tier 2", probably the more poorly run ones. Those smaller tournaments will still exist for the T2 teams. A player like Kefka probably wouldn't even be able to call himself a pro if there wasn't oversaturation. Look at the league scene, if you're not in an LCS team or a team vying for an LCS spot then you are nothing. There's no independent tournament to make your name. You either are either on a top 10 (or w/e) team in your region, make decent money streaming, or you are nothing.
Teams like 4ASC and VPP gain a lot more playing C9/EG/Secret than the other way around. I hope T2 tourneys don't die out but you have stuff like Dota Pit League/Synergy League etc. that are high paying lan tournaments and don't get much buzz on any dota site
League has a really structured ladder system where the top 5 stacks are moved up into the challenger division (think of EPL or La Liga with lower division teams that get promoted). The winners then move up into LCS and replace the lowest finishing teams in LCS. League if anything, is the most structured and has the least tournaments. It's much simpler to get noticed in League because there is only 1 way of developing and it's confined to whatever region your team is based in. It's also relatively fair and quite transparent as to how to get into the "pro circuit" (though it has been taken advantage by Chinese b-teams lol)
which hot team of the moment was rejected by valve ? if you say kaipi, i am just gonna laugh
the wink was a kaipi joke but realtalk potm bottom got jobbed for TI2. I'm 100% sure they would have finished higher than any western team outside of Na'Vi (and maybe original EG) they were first or second every tourney for like 2-3 months and iG practiced the most with them lol
This will be a crosspost, I will post it on its own elsewhere as I hope for it to be properly discussed.
Why EE is wrong:
EE's post is riddled with implicit and explicit errors.
1. Interest in tournaments: a. Why are people interested in tournaments, what creates interest and maintains interest? i. People are interested in tournaments because they enjoy watching DotA. The reason there are more tournaments is because there’s more demand for DotA content. The additional DotA content increases general interest and stimulates more demand. The market grows. ii. The variable here is the amount of interest. EE’s problem is that he views the talent as a constant. b. Is interest a zero sum game? i. Interest is not a zero sum game. The total amount of interest in the scene and value put into it increases with the number of fans and how much those fans care about the scene. There is not a constant number of fans spread between an ever growing number of tournaments, there is a growing number of tournaments and a growing number of fans. This is most importantly reflected in the growing amount of money this industry is generating. c. Is talent a zero sum game? i. No. This is where EE comes unstuck. EE views talented players as a constant – that there is a small and finite number of top level players who will not grow with the scene. If the number of tournaments is growing, and the number of fans is growing, and with that the amount of money is growing, why does EE think the number of professional players will not grow? ii. This is where we come to the crux of EE’s error. There is, for all practicable purposes, an infinite number of players at or able to reach EE’s level of skill. As the monetary compensation for play increases, we will see more players invest the time and effort required to reach peak professional play, to feed the growing number of fans and tournaments. iii. EE believes he should be a protected species, in a trade union for players, to insulate him from upcoming talent.
2. Do tournament organisers adequately respect players? a. What is a professional player? i. A professional player is a player who has taken DotA up as a profession – whose primary source of income is DotA. b. What level of respect should a professional player receive? i. A professional in any market receives the amount of respect he needs to continue in the profession. This respect takes the form of money, social status and fringe benefits, among other things. The amount of “respect” any wage earner receives is in proportion to their value. c. What level of respect do professional players receive? i. None of them have quit citing lack of respect – be it status, remuneration or fringe benefits. ii. It is therefore reasonable to assume that EE overvalues himself and other professional players. He is whinging.
3. Are there too many tournaments? a. Number of tournaments vs number of teams vs number of viewers: i. All else being equal, these things have stayed more or less in balance. What has changed is the workload for top teams, who have chosen to commit to too many tournaments. b. “The player’s association will try to fix some issues…” i. EE is joining a player’s union headed by a shady individual to try to protect players from market forces. c. The ticket system creates too much value, which creates too many tournaments, which devalues the whole thing? i. Baw. ii. You are deriving your livelihood from it, directly and indirectly.
4. The International: a. The major problem is that every tournament is a qualifier for TI, because TI dwarfs the scene. i. This is actually an important point that needs to be addressed properly, because it’s the point where the greatest risk of EE fucking the scene in the arse exists. ii. What does TI actually do at the moment? + Show Spoiler +
1. TI creates an informal season around DotA, where TI itself is the finals, the period before it is the season and the season after it is the transfer window. 2. The money and attention brought by TI filters into the rest of the year by creating legitimacy around the year and providing unquantified importance to smaller tournaments, attracting players and viewers. 3. Since invites are primarily based on performance, TI clearly creates a perception by certain literally minded players that they must participate in every tournament to be a chance.
1. Assuming you want TI to happen, I’ve seen dozens of suggestions for how to change TI. Most of them are really bad. Here are the two most popular at the moment: a. Adopt a formal qualifier format: i. This is bad because all you’re doing is formalising a process that already exists. This will simply create a “boys club” worse than what already exists because breaking from second and third string tournaments to the first string TI qualifiers would be virtually impossible. The reason this is attractive to certain pro players is because it allows them to minimise their workload by protecting themselves from needing to compete in robust competition. ii. This would destroy the growing industry in minor tournaments by creating the “eagle in a chicken coup effect” where the best teams would most likely game one another to enter smaller tournaments just to collect the prize money. iii. This would destroy any hope of upcoming teams improving because it would deny them the ability to frequently test their skills against top teams in a dynamic continuum of skill. iv. If you want to see what these solutions look like various model forms, look at WCS or how ACE ran their tournaments in the lead up to TI3. It doesn’t work. It’s fucking bad. b. Break TI into a number of smaller tournaments to spread the load throughout the year: i. The current format of a big TI has the positive effect of informally structuring the year as discussed above. This model would almost certainly destroy that. The 2-4 mini-Tis would just be more tournaments in a year totally without structure. ii. Additionally, TI would not be TI without Valve’s care and attention. Valve’s personal interaction with the community is what TI is and Valve is not an event hosting company. I would posit that Valve probably already considers that it spends more time than it really should organising and participating in TI. iii. Logistical concerns aside, the idea that the solution to solving there being too many tournaments by increasing the number of tournaments is silly. The idea that you make unimportant tournaments seem more important by making important tournaments less important is similarly backwards.
*****
I have to be extremely clear here. Player unions and formal regulators have damaged scenes in the past. You only need look to the ACE catastrophe to see how central control of these resources leads to corruption, nepotism, failure to innovate and a failure to grow talent and depth in competition. You only need look to KESPA to see how these organisations fail to enforce ethical standards. The only people these moves favour are the current crop of top string players – everyone else loses so they can win more.
*****
5. Reduced standard of casting: a. Randoms casting. i. Yep, outsourced labour was how brands dealt with the increased amount of tournaments. For the most part, outsourced casters are very good, though there are some exceptions. But, shit, if you have a problem with Lysander and don’t have an issue with Zyori, you’re probably beyond hope anyway. But tuk muh juhbs! b. Casters don’t adequately organise cocasters. i. The market will move to better casters who have better cocasters. Let it sort itself out. c. Casters don’t express emotion the same way EE does or would like them to. i. Baw.
*****
The elephant in the room: Betting. E-Sports rigging. Throwing. 322. There is a reason that EE doesn't want to specifically address this, which is that it doesn't suit is narrative of "Oh, but pity us because of all these tournaments."
Conclusion: If EE doesn't like it, he should leave. If he doesn't, it's ample evidence that his current respect and remuneration is adequate.
EE appears to be a statist with no understanding of the foibles of bureaucracy. He should consider a career in politics on the left somewhere or as a trade unionist, as it suits his fantastic misunderstanding of markets and optimism that explicit rules are better than implicit market solutions. He seems to vastly overestimate his long term value, and if these rumours of a player union are true, they are really, really bad news for DotA in the medium and long term because they will primarily serve current high level players to the exclusion of the dozens of other important stakeholders in the equation.
I wholeheartedly agree with you. The hype for TI2 and TI3 were so real but it has since dropped off since then... I believe there needs to be fewer (and since the game has a huge community, more rewarding) tournaments for higher competition. I believe in the need for lots of tournaments at a low level so people can get stepping stones into the professional scene. In sports there is usually 1, 2, maybe 3 big leagues/ tournaments that teams compete in - I feel this is how Dota should aim to be (maybe 2 international leagues and 1 regional give or take a couple). Like you said, tournament organizers all want to make money off of such a competitive video game, but the sponsors that are funding these events should manage their investments better and promote larger tournaments.
EPT
